


Under An Iron Fist

by Cut_Tooth



Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Angst, Drama, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-20
Updated: 2018-01-20
Packaged: 2018-08-23 13:19:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 55,409
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8329390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cut_Tooth/pseuds/Cut_Tooth
Summary: Nick Wilde found something to be off in Zootopia. Tensions rose after that fateful press conference. The next thing he knows, he's waking up from a coma 3 years later. Predators are forced to wear shock collars, an entire class of species is separated from society, and Nick has to come to the realization that a previous friend might have something to do with it... (Zystopian AU)





	1. An Unfortunate Way to Start Things Off

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this up on fanfiction.net for a while, but figured this might be a more suitable platform for this work. Author's notes will begin at Chapter 13, because as of now, many from previous chapters are outdated. Hope you enjoy!

Nothing could compare to the anguish I was feeling. The one time somebody thinks I can be something more than a fox, more than a shifty con-artist, they went and did...this.

“Just when I thought somebody actually believed in me, huh?” I pulled out the slip of paper and handed it to the bunny that caused all of this. “Probably best if you don’t have a  _ predator _ as a partner.”

I made my way past the barrage of news reporters and tore off the police badge sticker from my shirt, ignoring the protests of the rabbit behind me.

_ What a fucking waste of two days. How could she do something like that to me? To think that I was willing to be her partner, to trust her with my life… _

After a twenty minute walk to my filthy ditch under a bridge (or home, as I like to call it) I whipped out some shades and settled down on my foldable lawn chair. 

It was a cloudy day in Zootopia, not raining yet but a storm was definitely brewing. Aside from the unfortunate occurrences at the press conference, everything was normal. I shivered at the thought of what just happened. Simply being reminded of it filled me with pure disgust.

It was around noon, so morning rush hour has long since passed. Besides the occasional passing of a car, chirping of a bird, or rustle of the wind, everything was relatively silent. 

Seeing as the entire ‘police investigation’ fiasco was over I could finally drift back into my usual daily habits; sleep during the day, hang out at night, and pull off cons in the morning. Rinse, wash, repeat. And now was the perfect time to get some rest. 

With an exasperated exhale I hoisted myself out of my sedentary position and dragged my feet over to my makeshift bed. A sleeping bag on top of an egg foam mattress cemented itself on the grainy dirt underneath, the mattress coming from a particularly funny con involving a laughably gullible pig and a phony health inspection card. Reminding myself of the experience gave me a short-lived chuckle.

I curled up on the bed, at last giving my aching body a break.

_ Jeez, these past two day have been the most exercise I’ve gotten in years! I really am a scrawny sack of shit… _

My self-deprecating thoughts lulled me off to sleep.

* * *

 

The next few days I had an especially low amount of motivation. Considering I have enough spare food stashed away with me to last a week (I always take precautions in the chance of a con gone wrong), I figured it wouldn’t hurt to skip a few days of work. I use the term ‘work’ very lightly.

Nothing could really cheer me up from what had happened. I was completely drained, all because of...her. Judy Hopps. She dragged me into this stupid Night Howler case so she could finally be respected as a cop, and then threw me away once she got what she wanted. She  _ used  _ me. The part that made it hurt most was that her confidence in me almost seemed genuine.

_ It couldn’t have been though. She had forty-eight fucking hours to dump that fox spray but she didn’t. She sees me as a worthless fox, just like everyone else. She- _

The ring of my phone interrupted my mental rant. I blinked a few times and shook my head to get my bearings back in order when I realized I was clenching my paws so hard that it started to draw blood. I crouched next to my bed to find a Hawaiian shirt I wasn’t specifically fond of, quickly wiped off the newly opened wounds, and accepted the call without even checking the ID.

“WILDE!”

I drew the phone away from my ear as fast as I had placed it there; the deep, unnaturally loud voice catching me off guard.

_ Well  _ this’ll  _ be a fun conversation… _

“Finnick! Buddy! How’s my favorite fennec friend?” I answered, replacing my sour mood with my usual smug tone.

“CUT THE SHIT WILDE! I AIN’T BEEN MAKING CASH FOR FIVE FUCKING DAYS SINCE YOU BEEN WORKING WITH THE FUZZ! WHERE THE HELL YOU AT?”

“Well good morning to you too, sunshine! Did the lack of my presence really make my baby boy  _ that  _ upset?”

“GET YOUR ASS TO MY VAN RIGHT NOW! I HAVEN’T CONNED SINCE YOU LEFT AND I’M RUNNING LOW ON GAS MONEY!”

I let out a pained sigh. Conning was the  _ last _ thing I wanted to do at the moment, but that little furball would beat my skull in with a baseball bat if I didn’t show up. I quickly weighed my options…

“Be there in ten, pal. Get your elephant suit ready!”

There was a slight pause before Finnick answered in a drastically softer voice.

“...Nick, I think we’re gonna need to change our game a little bit.”

My smirk dropped for a moment before plastering itself back on my face.

“Somebody getting tired of being kissed on the forehead? Finnick, I know you hate it but a man’s gotta eat. Besides, if it means anything I think you look adorable as an elephant.”

“Shut the hell up Nick. It ain’t that. Them jumbo pop sellers ain’t gon’ trust us no matter how ‘cute’ you make me look. It’s not happening. We need a new plan, ASAP.”

The smirk left again.

“I’ve been doing this since I was twelve, Finnick, you really think I can’t handle my trademark con?”

“Nick...some stores ain’t even letting predators inside.”

I lost all hope of the smirk coming back. I repeated what I had just heard in my head a couple times, trying to make sense of it.

“I...what?”

“The van’s still next to that chinese restaurant. Get over here soon.”

And with that the call ended.

* * *

 

Something was off. It wasn’t obvious at first, but as Nick walked along the streets of Zootopia it slowly became clear. There was a noticeable lack of predators outside. Those that were had their heads down and hands in their pockets. Whenever prey neared said predators, they either turned around or crossed to the other side of the street. Okay, something was  _ definitely  _ off.

I picked up the pace, the strange nature of what I’d been seeing being slightly unsettling. As I reared around a corner to my desired street, a passing bunny let out a small gasp, backing away from me and pulling her child close. I looked back at her for my next few steps, giving her a quizzical look before returning my gaze ahead of me.

_ What the hell is going on? _

The door to Finnick’s van opened before I even knocked, leaving me with my arm held up in an awkward position.

“Get in,” he muttered, baseball bat in hand. I climbed into his surprisingly roomy vehicle and turned around to see the fennec looking around outside for an extra few seconds before closing the door. 

The back of the van was carpeted and filled with many different colorful cushions. Next to one of the bigger cushions, most likely Finnick’s bed, was a CD player and a couple of lit candles. 

I sat down with one knee up, draping my arm over it to support myself. “The walk here was...uncomfortable to say the least,” I said, cracking the silence. “It seemed like people were avoiding me, some even afraid of me! I know that most people don’t like foxes but this is something else.”

I looked up at Finnick who was currently fixated on the patterns of his carpet. He slowly looked up and met my gaze.

“It’s getting bad, Nick.”

Almost all intimidation had left his voice. What used to be an oxymoronically frightening mammal appeared to be almost broken.

“What happened?”

His eyebrows narrowed down in anger. “YOU’RE FUCKING BUNNY FRIEND THAT’S WHAT HAPPENED!” The frightening mammal was back.

“Judy? I mean, uh, Officer Toot-toot? What does that clown have to do with anything?”

Finnick’s face matched a look of pure disgust. “On live television, in front all of Zootopia, she said that only predators go savage. That it’s in our biology.” He sighed before continuing. “Prey ain’t reacting too well to say the least. Not all prey, but enough to make an impact.”

I opened my mouth to say something, maybe make a snarky reply to ease the tension, but nothing came to me. I reverted my gaze the healing claw marks on my palms.

_ It’s all her fault. She didn’t only use me, but she somehow managed to spark the hatred of an entire class of species. _

I reached back to scratch my neck. “...so what does this mean for us?”

Finnick dropped his negative expression and looked back down at the carpet. “We gonna do what we always do...it’s just gonna be a hell of a lot harder.”

* * *

 

We spent the next few hours discussing possible future courses of action before giving in to our natural circadian rhythms and taking an afternoon nap. At around 11 p.m we were back to planning, but nothing seemed to be plausible considering the current situation. I eventually dismissed myself after the unsuccessful briefing and headed home, the only life outside being the infrequent passing of cars.

I tucked my paws into my pockets and pressed my lips together in thought. How could it have gotten so bad so fast? Surely the ZPD’s looked into other possible causes of the savage predators, right? Either way, the sudden shift of opinion towards predators was all but expected. Would they really hate us at the drop of a hat? I can’t speak for everybody, but I assume most prey in this city have a pred friends, or acquaintances at the very least.

_ They’re worried for their safety. They think I’m dangerous. They’re scared of me. _

That thought didn’t sit too well. The only person that’s ever shown legitimate fear of me was...Judy, at the conference. 

_ Did she plan this? No, she couldn’t have, that’s not like her...but I had a lot of beliefs about her that were proven wrong. _

These theories were short-lived when I picked up the sound of heavy breathing and footsteps. I looked up to see bulky tiger sprint his way around the corner of an apartment complex. For such a dangerous-looking guy, it was surprising to note that he seemed scared shitless.

I stopped dead in my tracks with my mouth slightly open in confusion. He was running straight towards me. 

He finally noticed me when he was about fifty meters from where I stood, and raised up a paw motioning for me to turn around.  

“RUN! THEY’RE COMING!”

I did  _ not _ want to get punished whatever this guy’s getting chased for, so I did as I was told. I looked over my shoulder to see the tiger nearly caught up to me. Curiosity took over.

“What’s going on?! Who’s com-”

The screeching of tires drowned out what I was yelling. The glaring headlights from a black pickup truck reared the same corner the tiger came from. There were mammals riding on the back, everybody on board the vehicle wearing masks. One of them leaned out from behind the head of the truck, and he looked like he was holding something.

_ Wait, is that a- _

Gunshots confirmed my assumptions. One shattered on the road ahead of me, with another whistling right past my ear. The tiger ran up next to me as we turned another corner.

“Is there anywhere we can go?” he asked between panted breaths. Genuine fear etched his voice.

Luckily I knew this city like the back of my paw. I grabbed his arm and motioned towards an upcoming alleyway. “This way!”

There was a vixen who I was...friendly with. Jump the brick divider in the alley and her apartment’s right there. She was a bit too affectionate so I only relied on her when I was drunk and desperate, but I knew she would still let me inside in a heartbeat. I like to think that I’m charming enough to get to anyone.

We turned into the alleyway and approached the divider. I figured since he’s a tiger he’d be able to pull me up much easier than the other way around, so I got to one knee and cupped my paws together to hoist him atop. He got the memo quickly and swung over to the other side, still holding on to the wall reach back and grab me. I grasped his paw and he started pulling me up when a sharp bang echoed through the alley, along with a sharp pain shooting up my arm.

I fell onto the concrete, eyes clenched together in pain, before realizing the life-or-death situation I was in. I attempted to get onto my feet and looked up at the tiger, who was scrambling to grab hold of me again.

“C’mon! Grab my p- SHIT!”

A bullet smashed against the brick next to him, sending flying debris directly into my eyes. I attempted to clear my eyes and managed to see the tiger taking a glimpse of horror at our attackers. He jumped off to the other side of the wall, leaving me alone.

I pressed my back against the wall and slowly turned my head to identify who was doing this. Five mammals, one holding a silver handgun that shined in the darkness, stood before me. Most of them appeared to be on the smaller side, with the exception of a mammal on the far left, who was unmistakingly an elephant.

_ Why does he even bother wearing a mask? _

The one with the gun started moving further towards me, only making me clutch my bleeding injury harder and press further against the bricks behind me. I used my good arm to wipe away the remaining debris from my eyes to get a good look at the mammal now standing inches away from me. His mask was pure white, with two slits for eyeholes crudely cut out. I looked at his eyes and noticed that they refused to shine in the darkness. Looking around at everyone else, I noticed that it was the same case for them as well.

_ They’re all prey...this is a hate crime. _

The masked gunman in front of me spent no time stalling. He cocked the gun and pointed it straight at my head.

“Filthy pred.”

His voice was tinged with a raging aggression. Without a second for me to think, the gun went off.


	2. Three Years

_ You don’t have to do this. _

I silently stood at the door of a rundown condo. The cracks in the concrete nearly made walking safely impossible. And this neighborhood stank. Bad. Like old milk and piss.

_ You could just walk away, she never has to see you again. _

My heartbeat was going at a slightly faster pace than normal. I tried to keep my emotions in order as I eyed the chipping paint of the wooden door in front of me.

_ You’ve made it this far without her. You don’t want to see her and she doesn’t want to see you. _

I took a deep breath and knocked. The sound echoed throughout the entire street, momentarily alerting the few other mammals that had the unfortunate privilege of living here. This was a predator dominant part of the city. Some things never change.

I heard the rustling of a lock, then another, and a third. Clearly this wasn’t the safest place to call home.

The door creaked open to reveal an elderly vixen, bearing a cane in her right paw and balancing herself on the door with her left. Her outfit matched the financial situation of the rest of the neighborhood. A stained and stretched out white t-shirt hung loosely from her body, and grey sweatpants coiled down her legs and covered her feet.

She stared for a moment before her eyes widened in recognition.

“Hi Mom.”

My breath was nearly knocked out of me as I was drawn into a rib-crushing hug. Tears began to soak into my shirt from the muzzle buried directly into my shoulder. Despite her seemingly weakened state, she managed to squeeze even tighter, as if she somehow wasn’t close enough.

I hesitantly raised my paws before wrapping them around the sobbing woman and returning the gesture.

“Can I come in?” I said quietly.

She slowly detached her limbs from my body, wiped away a few tears, and nodded in excitement.

The vixen bent down to grab the cane that had clattered to the floor during the struggle for my embrace. A shaking paw grasped it before she rose and leaned back against the door. Looking like she had the energy of a sloth on depressants, she smiled and gestured me inside.

Her house wasn’t a huge step up from the sorry sight outside. The walls looked extremely dirty, as if no one bothered to even slap a single coat of paint on when the place was built. A total of two light fixtures could be seen, filling the room with a melancholy dimness. 

I stepped inside and noticed that I was already in the bedroom, the only other obvious place in the house being the kitchen. A single foldout couch rested itself against the wall, with a comically small television not to far away from it. 

The door shut.

“It’s really you…”

I turned to see my mother gazing at me with a mixture of amazement and regret. Both paws folded around her cane, clutching it so hard her knuckles began to turn white.

“It’s really me,” I confirmed.

We stood in silence.

“Let me make you some coffee.”

With that she shuffled to the only other room in the house, leaving me pondering what I should say next. I remained still, listening to the opening of cupboards and buzzing of a coffeemaker.

“It’s been...uh...it’s been a while…” I muttered nervously. My right paw started to rub my left arm up and down. I haven’t let worry take over me like this in a long time. It must’ve been-

“Fourteen years,” I heard the frail voice reply from the kitchen.

I nodded despite her not being able to see me.

More noise from the kitchen. I threatened to speak again.

“Mom?”

“Hm?” I made out as the coffee started blending.

“I um...how old am I?”

The noise stopped. My mother’s head poked out from the kitchen doorframe, a confused look spread across her face.

“It’s just...I haven’t celebrated my birthday in a while and I kinda...lost track of time, I guess,” I explained.

She opened her mouth for a second and then closed it again, replacing her confused look with understanding.

“You’re twenty-six, Nick,” she said quietly. “You’re twenty-six, and you’re birthday’s May 13th.”

She looked at me for a while longer before resuming her work on the coffee. Time seemed to pass slowly, but eventually the vixen presented herself again, carrying two mugs of coffee on a tray as to maintain her balance with her cane. She flicked her head towards the small plastic table behind her. There were two chairs.

Once my coffee was in paw and the steam was cleared, we began to sip in tranquility.

“What brought you back?”

I looked up at my mother, her eyes pleading me for a full explanation.

“...I don’t know. I just felt like it was about time.”

She nodded her head and sighed, taking another sip from her mug. “I care about you, Nick. I worried about you every waking minute to this very day. You could’ve been sick, or kidnapped, even dead and I wouldn’t have known. You just disappeared.”

I looked back down at my coffee in shame. “I’m sorry.”

“When I told you to clean up your act or leave my house, I never would’ve thought you’d take the latter,” she continued. “If I’d known I would’ve never given you the option. I’d rather have you committing crimes in the streets and coming back home at night than committing crimes in the streets and staying there afterwards. You left me alone to drown in hypotheticals.”

I knew I needed to say something comforting. “I’m not doing anything illegal anymore, Mom.”

Her ears perked up at this. “You’re not?”

“...I mean, not by definition.”

Her ears drooped back down. “What’s that supposed to mean.”

“Well, I’m not actually breaking any laws but...I can certainly see why I would be on the ‘police radar,’ so to speak.”

My gaze shifted towards her. Her face told me I should elaborate.

“I’m a conman, Mom.”

She blinked a few times and rested her head in her paws, giving a drawn out sigh. “You can be so much more though, Nicky.” She calls me that when she wants to get to me. Anyone else and it would fail miserably, but for some reason it always works with her. “I know you. You’re such a smart man, and I hate to see you wasting your potential on such a low profession.”

Yeah, she  _ really  _ gets to me.

“ _ Wasting _ my potential?” I retaliated, my voice jumping to a higher dynamic. “Trust me Mom, with the way people see me this is the best I can do.”

“You don’t have to limit yourself just because you’re a fox, Nicky.” Her voice managed to stay calm and composed. “You can get a real job if you really set your mind to it.”

“A real job?!” I was practically yelling now. “I’m actually making money! I don’t have to live off of fucking welfare and food stamps like you do!” She visibly winced at that but I kept going. “I don’t know if you’ve realized this, Mom, but we’re  _ foxes _ . People don’t trust us with ‘real jobs’ and they never will.”

I’d been so caught up in my rant that I didn’t notice that I’d gotten up from my chair and spilled coffee all over the table. The liquid dribbled onto the floor as it fell off the side, but my mom kept looking directly at me, fresh tears threatening to run down her face.

Yet she stayed silent.

“I knew coming here was a mistake,” I muttered. “Thanks for the coffee.” I turned away from her and had nearly reached the door when she spoke up.

“I want you to come back...but I don’t know if I’ll be able to wait much longer,” she managed to get out, voice cracking.

I closed my eyes and began to respond, but didn’t rotate to look her in the eye.

“Then don’t bother.” 

I left the house.

* * *

 

I shifted under the sheets of the bed, my head burying itself in the the pillow underneath me. Apparently I’d been tossing and turning like this for a while; I was sweating. I threw the covers off of me and tried to shift onto my side when a wire on my arm held me back. I sighed and returned to my original position.

_ Wait...sheets, bed...wires? What the fuck? _

My eyes shot open, quickly adjusting to the darkness around me. I wasn’t under a bridge in a shitty makeshift bed, and I certainly wasn’t in an alleyway lying in a pool of my own blood. I traced the source of the wire on my arm to an IV bag which was standing next to several beeping monitors. 

I looked straight forward to quite the unsettling sight.

A large tube was inserted directly into my abdomen, a second tube not to far away as well. They both ran into their own independent machines. I laid my head back down on the pillow and took a few deep breathes to keep myself under control.

_ Okay Nick, just do what you usually do in a strange situation. Mark your surroundings, scope out possible exits, identify potential threats. _

The ICU I was in didn’t seem to be too top notch, but then again, I’d been careful enough to avoid hospitals since I started living on my own, so I wouldn’t know. I moved my field of view to the right.

_ Aha! Window! _

A shady looking brick building stood right outside, and the low amount of lighting on the streets illuminated a slew of trash on the streets.

_ Alright, bad neighborhood. Just my luck. _

The sound of gunshots made me jolt up, causing the monitors next to me to beep much faster.

_ Scratch that.  _ Really _ bad neighborhood. _

I double-checked my environment to see if I’d missed anything. 

_ Single door entrance, not including the window, and no one else is in the room with me. _

Not that I was going anywhere with two tubes halfway inside of my body.

_ Time to think. How did I get here? I couldn’t have been shot in the face or else I’d be dead, so that must’ve been a dream or something. But does that mean the entire day was a dream? Maybe Finnick gave me some expired chinese food, I passed out, and imagined the rest of it. Let’s check for damage to be sure. _

My arms appeared to be fine, although moving them took a little more effort than I was used to. I was able to make my paw into a fist, but couldn’t move any of my fingers independently. Everything felt stiff, like I was lying in a pile of snow for two hours and took some painkillers to compensate.

Other than that and the obvious holes in my stomach everything seemed to be in order.

I relaxed my muscles and stared up at the ceiling.

_ And now we play the waiting game. _

The constant beeping of the machines next to me didn’t help time go by any faster. My annoyance quickly grew and I looked over to see if there was anything I could do about it. Instead I saw a button that would call a nurse if I needed assistance.

_ I guess the waiting game can wait. _

Even  _ I _ think my jokes are terrible.

I struggled to lift my arm (which at the moment felt like molten lead) and eventually managed to press the button.

Within a surprisingly short amount of time the door opened to reveal a tough-looking badger with a mohawk, juxtaposed by the white medical outfit she was wearing. I really didn’t know what to think of her, but she seemed...oddly familiar.

We made eye contact and she immediately broke out a smile.

“Hellooooooooo.”

Her voice was certainly far from feminine, but matched her strange appearance quite well. Once I got a better look at her I noticed there was an odd looking collar with a green light around her neck.

“Um, hi.”

She clapped her paws together, for some reason appearing very excited. “Alright. First things first, can you tell me your full name, age, and date of birth?”

She looked at me expectantly. This badger really wasn’t making this situation any more comfortable.

“Actually, I’d like to know yours first, if you don’t mind.”

She widened her eyes and slapped a paw against her forehead. “Of course! I’m so sorry. I’m Dr. Madge Badger. You’re currently in the Happytown District Hospital.”

My sarcastic attitude decided to kick in.

“Happytown, you say? Why, I don’t seem to be feeling particularly elated at the moment. Perhaps you oughta give me a higher dosage of whatever’s being pumped into my organs at the moment.” I nodded towards the very hard to miss obstructions stemming out of me.

Either the doctor doesn’t understand what humor is or she wasn’t amused.

“Let me ask again, sir. Can you tell me your full name, age and date of birth?”

_ Okay, I’m not gonna get very far with this girl. Better cooperate. _

“Nicholas Piberius Wilde, thirty-two years old, and…” I scrunched my face up in thought. “May...13th?”

The badger pulled a small notepad out of her pocket and scribbled something down.

“Good, good,” she said to herself quietly.

Curiosity got the better of me.

“What’s up with the collar, doc?”

She took a break from her writing to give me a short-lived quizzical look, which soon softened back into the smile from earlier.

“You’ve been out for a while, Mr. Wilde. We’ll get to the details later, but right now we need to make sure you’re in a healthy state. I’ll run a few tests, nothing much different from a regular checkup.”

I haven’t had a checkup since I was a kid.

She began a brief session of squeezing multiple parts of my body to confirm if my nerves were functioning properly, then took my blood pressure and shined a small light in my eyes, ears, and mouth.

“Alrighty, things are looking pretty good.”

_ Pretty good? I don’t have the coordination to flip this doctor off, so I’d say things are far from pretty good. _

“Then how come I can barely move my own body, huh?”

Her eyebrows furrowed, clearly trying to think of an ideal response.

“Um, Mr. Wilde, you’ve been in a...you’ve been in a coma for quite some time now…”

_Well that’s just peachy._  
“Har, har, doc. Did Finnick put you up to this? That fennec bastard has the worse sense of humor,” I joked.

“Mr. Wilde, I hate to-”

“Please, call me Nick, sweetheart.”

“...Nick, I hate to tell you that this isn’t some sort of prank. You received a near fatal shot to the head and have been out for about 3 years now.”

_ I guess that ‘peachy’ is too light of a word to describe  _ that.

“Wait, but...that was a dream, though. How the fuck does someone survive a shot to the head?” Saying I was a little confused would be quite the understatement.

“The bullet traveled dead center through your head. It severed your corpus callosum, but that’s only a minor issue. The real problem was the bullet also slightly grazed your left brain. It didn’t damage anything, but it caused your brain to swell. Once it swelled too much, it started to push down on the brain stem, causing the reticular activating system to temporarily shut down. That’s what sent you into the coma.”

I clenched my eyes shut and shook my head in utter disbelief. This was just too much. “So you’re saying I’ve been asleep for 3 years? Holy shit, I’m thirty-five…”

“The important thing is you’re in stable condition. All of your injuries have healed quite nicely, and you’re in the best pred hospital in all of Happytown. Your muscles have obviously been inactive for some time, but with a bit of physical therapy, we’ll have you out of here just as you came in.”

_ Really? This is the best hospital they could put me in? Wait a second...pred hospital? _

“I’m gonna have to stop you right there, doc. What exactly did you mean when you said ‘pred hospital’?” I would’ve used air quotes, but tragically that wasn’t an ability I had at the moment.

The badger let out a deep breath of air. “Look, you’ve missed a lot since you’ve been out. Us predators...we-”

Her explanation was cut short when a sharply dressed otter burst into the room, followed by two equally dressed wolves not too far behind him.

“Daniel,” the doctor started, “now really isn’t the best time to-”

“Cut the crap, Honey, I’ve waited far too long for this,” he replied sternly. He jumped up onto my bed and inched uncomfortably close to my face. If I had the muscle strength to move, I would’ve punted the creepy fucker like a football.

“Um, you’re obviously not too skilled at introductions,” I tried to smirk and gave a nervous chuckle.

The otter ignored my snide remark.

“Nick, I have reason to believe you’ve been formerly acquaintanced with a bunny by the name of Judy Hopps…”


	3. Daniel the Otter

_ She  _ was the last thing I wanted to talk about. I would’ve rather gotten back to the fact that I’d been in a coma for three fucking years, but luck just never seems to be on a fox’s side. The otter stared at me intently, waiting for a reply. Now that he was up close and personal, I noticed that he had the exact same collar, albeit smaller, that Dr. Badger was wearing.

“Look, I’ve had a rough day today and I’d really rather avoid talking about Lola Bunny’s half-breed cousin at the moment. So how about you, quite literally, get off my chest and let me continue my conversation with the doc over here.” I attempted to make a gesture in the Badger’s direction, but my muscles were still failing me.

To my dismay, the otter walked even closer to my face, practically centimeters away from touching my lips.

_ Okay, if this guy fucking kisses me... _

“I don’t have all day Nick. Hopps is a very important target for us right now and we’d rather not waste precious time dilly-daddling with some lowlife fox who can’t even die correctly; so drop the bullshit act, and speak up.”

I gulped.

_ Shit, for an otter this guy’s scary. Okay, okay...just do what you always do. Never let them see that they get to you. _

I replaced any possible look of fear with the slyest grin I could possibly muster.

“Alright, otter, I’ll play along. Officer Judy Hopps, a.k.a Officer TootToot, a.k.a Carrots, a.k.a Fluff, a.k.a-”

The otter let out an audible growl.

“...sorry. Um, where to start? She threatened to imprison me if I didn’t help her solve her case, she dragged me into countless life threatening situations, and to top it all off, she completely betrayed any trust or respect I had for her when she blamed predators’ savagery on biology. Anything else you wanna know?” I was too caught up in my rant to realize that I’d dropped the smirk halfway through. I quickly collected myself and returned to my natural, smug state.

“Any weaknesses?”

“Uh...what?”

“Don’t play games with me Wilde, I’m really losing patience here.”  
_This guy clearly doesn’t know me. Playing games is my favorite thing to do…_

“Well, she’s not a big fan of kryptonite, and she’s  _ really  _ uncomfortable around naked mammals. Hm...what else? Oh! Rotten carrots! Nothing makes her weaker than her favorite vegetable gone bad!” Sarcasm was practically oozing off of me at this point.

The otter took a break from admiring my muzzle to lean back and gaze at me with furiousness. The green light on his collar flashed yellow, letting out an audible  _ beep _ throughout the room, and the look of anger was momentarily taken over by fear. He briefly shut his eyes and took a long, deep breath. The light returned back to its original green. Eyes still closed, he raised his paw and snapped his fingers.

“Huskins, make him talk. If this vermin shit doesn’t have a collar to shock him, we might as well compensate with a little bit of homemade pain.”

One of the two wolves, a white and grey furred canine, walked over to my bedside, allowing the otter to hop off to the floor before wrapping his paws around one of the two tubes in my stomach.

The badger, who was at the moment hiding in the back corner of the room, widened her eyes and ran up to the wolf in protest.

“I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but you’re gonna have to find some other way to get info out of him,” she said warningly.

I looked up at the wolf, maintaining my grin. “I’d listen to the doc if I were you. Word on the street is honey badgers don’t give a shit.” I managed to let out a hoarse laugh at my own joke, earning me a look of disapproval from everyone in the room, including Madge. 

“Houndinski,” the otter piped up, “hold her back.”

The black wolf (who was the only one not currently swarming my bed) nodded, and wrapped two big arms around the badger, pulling her away from my reach.

“Woah! Hey! You can’t do this!” she yelled as she tried to pry away the limbs that entangled her. The light on her collar flashed yellow, just as it had for the otter. “Daniel! Tell him to let me go!”

“Sorry, Honey. You and I both know this information is vital, and we can’t let that go to waste because this  _ fox  _ is too ignorant to cooperate.”

“Hold on a second there, pal!” I chimed in. “I’ll have you know that I have a heavy skillset when it comes down to team-based activities. Cooperation is-”

I was cut off by the white and grey wolf wrenching the tube out of my body, spilling a food-like paste all over the bedsheets.

I winced for a second, but surprisingly, it didn’t hurt that much.

_ Huh. That was like ripping off a bandaid! Nicholas P. Wilde triumphs agai- _

And again I was cut off by the same wolf, only this time, he plunged a sharp claw into the exposed hole in my flesh.

A tidal wave of pain shot through my body, making my previously immobile limbs convulse in agony. I clenched my eyes closed and screamed at the top of my lungs.

The wolf leaned in as close as the otter before it. “No funny business, no bull shit. Talk.”

“Okay okay okay!” I gasped. “I barely know anything about her, I swear! I helped her out for two days, and that was it! I don’t know what you expect me to say!”

The otter was back on my bed. “You’re the only predator who interacted with Hopps since she arrived in Zootopia. We need to know everything that you know.”

I took a few short breaths and did my best to raise my eyelids to look at this dickwad in the eye.

“What the hell’s so important about her? She’s just a dumb little bunny!”

“Wilde, I realize that you have little to no knowledge of the events that have occurred over the past few years, but now is definitely not the time to sit around and play catchup.” His voice was still surprisingly collected given the circumstances. “I wanna leave you be just as much as you want my partner’s finger out of your abdomen, so how about we help each other out, hm?”

I took another couple of breaths before replying. “I-...uh, oh! Point out a flaw in her and she’ll do anything to prove you wrong! I know first paw! If it weren’t for that Otterton case, she probably would’ve quit a few days into the force!”

The otter’s jaw tightened at the the name ‘Otterton’. He crossed his arms and retaliated, “We’re gonna need a hell of a lot more than words to stop this bunny, Wilde.”

The wolf’s claw punctured me even further.

“Argh! Nononono, really! She walked into wet fucking cement while arguing with me about whether or not she’s a real cop! Put her into a tight spot and she crumbles easily!”

The otter stroked his chin for several seconds. “That all?”

I briskly nodded my head.

“Very well. Huskins! Houndinski! Our work is done here.” The wolf quickly took his finger out of my stomach, wiping the blood off in disgust. He muttered under his breath and turned to go to the door. The wolf holding Dr. Badger finally loosened his grip. She immediately ran over to me to put pressure on my newly bleeding wound. The otter hopped off of my bed and joined his colleagues.

“I really do hope the next time we meet it’s on better terms. It may not seem like it, but I can be a pretty reasonable guy when you aren’t fucking with me. Farewell!” The three left the room as if nothing happened.

The badger let out a sigh of relief and took her head to face me, receiving a conniving look in return.

“Badger, you’ve got a  _ lot  _ of explaining to do.”

* * *

 

Once the injury was taken care and the other tube was taken out of me (in a more professional manner, of course), the doctor pulled up a chair so she talk to me.

“Alright, I’ve got a hell of a lot of questions, so we’re just gonna have a speed round to start things off,” I said. “You ready?”

“I guess…”

“What’re the tubes for?”

“The one Huskins pulled out was a feeding tube. The other was a...um…’waste management’ tube,” she replied uncomfortably.

“Wonderful. Why was that otter calling you Honey, and can I partake in calling you such a name as well?”

“My friends call me Honey...and I guess after what you went through it’s only fair you join in.”

“Hold up, that asshat was your friend?”

Honey shrugged. “I suppose after what he just did I should reconsider my definition of ‘friend’, but yes Daniel is my friend. He wasn’t lying when he said he can be reasonable though. You  _ were _ being kind of a jackass.” She let a small smile breeze across her lips. I followed suit.

“I appreciate the feedback Hun Bun. I’ll try to pull off a more entertaining show in the future.”

“Please don’t.”

“Well I’m not gonna call him Daniel though, that’s for sure. I’ll probably go for something more along the lines of ‘Otter-Bottom’, maybe ‘The Little Critter that Could’.”

“I’m going to have to do everything in my power to avoid you calling him that.”

“Fair enough,” I complied. “You seem familiar. Do I know you from somewhere?”

The badger stroked her chin. “Well, you did help that rabbit solve the Night Howlers case. You must’ve seen me at Cliffside.”

My eyes widened. “Wait, you were the one helping Lionheart?” She nodded her head in confirmation. “How are you not in jail?”

“Lionheart was mayor of the city at the time. His position of power put me in a pretty tough spot when he came to me for help. However, because it wasn’t exactly through free will, I only ended up getting six months.”

I looked up at the ceiling in thought. “Huh, I guess that means I’m not the only criminal in the room?” I turned to her with a grin, getting her smile to grow wider. “Feels good to be accepted.” I fixed my gaze back on the ceiling. “Collars. What’s up with those?”

I saw Honey’s expression suddenly turn serious through my peripheral vision. Clearly this was a touchy subject.

“That’s a long story.”

“Trust me, Honey, I’ve got all the time in the world.”

She sighed. “After Officer Hopps had that press conference, tensions between pred and prey grew tremendously. Prey, naturally, were feeling extremely unsafe around us, and they did anything to avoid us. Most predators lost their jobs, prey wouldn’t let us into stores, some mammals were even kicked out of their homes; so Mayor Bellwether came up with a ‘master plan’ to get everything back to normal. She presented us with the idea of a shock collar that would remind us when we were reverting back to our savage ways. If we get too aggressive, we receive a small shock. Everybody wins.

Well...90% of Zootopia won. Prey wanted to stop living in fear, and predators wanted their normal lives back. Nearly everybody voted for the collars, and they were put into effect right away. Little did we know, Bellwether horribly mislead us about the specifications of the collars. They’re mandatory for all predators from the age of six onwards, and cannot be removed; trying to do so results in a shock. They promised it’ll only shock you when you’re aggressive, but it shocks you whenever you’re feeling too much of any emotion, no exceptions. It delivered a shock much greater than what was expected, and it varies in intensity depending on the gravity of emotions you’re feeling.

People have died from these things. The initial reaction to pain is fear. Some predators just aren’t skilled enough to bottle up their feelings, so they let fear take over them. They get trapped in a vicious cycle of terror and pain, until eventually they suffer cardiac arrest.”

I dared to look Honey in the eyes. I was met with a look of pure sadness, the collar around her neck blinking yellow.

“These things fucking kill people!” 

_ BZZZRT _

A small yelp escaped her mouth, and her paws flew up to clutch where she’d been electrocuted. I stared at her, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. She slowly lowered her arms back to her sides and managed to compose herself. Her gaze fell to the ground, as if she was embarrassed to look at me after her outburst.

“...why am I not wearing one?” I questioned.

She maintained her fixation on the tiles of the hospital floor. “You were taken to the hospital before any collar laws were passed. I guess they sort of...forgot about you.” She raised her head. “You got pretty lucky,” she managed with a weak smile.

“Heh, ya,” I agreed. What she said stuck with me however. They  _ forgot  _ about me.

“Did anybody, um...did anybody visit while I was out?”

“The first six months you were here I was in the slammer. If anybody came at all, it was then.” She let what she said hang for a second before adding a brief, “Sorry,” to sympathize.

“Nah it’s alright. I’m used to it.”

We sat in silence for what seemed like 5 minutes.

“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable when asking about the collars. You can go now if you’d like.”

Honey kept a glossy eyed stare in my general direction, as if in thought, before realizing that she had to speak. She cleared her throat. “Are you sure? You don’t need to apologize, I got carried away and let my emotions get the better of me.”

“Well, is there anything else we need to go over? I really don’t wanna get into whatever that otter was torturing me for. I’ve had to take in more information than I can muster for one day.”

The badger nodded her head, and began to get out of her chair before she stopped for a moment.

“Something wrong, Honey?”

“...tell me about yourself.”

I looked at her in confusion. “Excuse me?”

“I’ve been watching you sleep for two and a half years now. I’d just like to know more about the real you...if you’re okay with that, that is.”

I continued giving her a funny look. The last person that’s ever wanted to know anything about me, the  _ real  _ me, was my mother. Finnick and I usually kept quiet about our own personal lives, usually just playing off of what we see in each other externally. Such a question was so foreign to me, and I came to the realization that I barely knew anything about myself as well.

_ I’m a con man, that’s for sure. I don’t really have any friends or family, and it’s been over twenty years since I’ve had a genuine close relationship. What else is there to tell? _

Honey continued the conversation for me. “I mean, from that run-in with Daniel and all, I get the notion that you’re sarcastic and sly...and you really don’t know how to keep your mouth shut.”

I attempted to shrug.

_ Damn muscles. _

“What can I say? I’m an open book. There’s not much else to know.”

“Really? I highly doubt that a few bad jokes make up your entire personality. There’s gotta be something you can tell me.”

“...I don’t really know where to start.”

“Okay, I’ll help you. What kind of movies do you like?”

“Never been to a theater in my life.”  
“How do you spend your free time?”

“Next question.”

“Any restaurants you’re a fan of?”

“Pass.”

The badger let out a grunt of defeat and crossed her arms. “Open book my ass…” she muttered.

My ears pressed back against my head. I couldn’t help but feel bad about being so secretive about my identity. This person that I’d practically just met (not including the time spent in comatose) was making more of an effort to get to know me than anyone has in a really long time, and I just shut her down.

“I listen to a lot of music.”

Honey’s ears perked up at my unexpected participation in our chat.

“Really? What bands.”

“Eh, a whole slew of ‘em. Radoehead’s probably my favorite.”

The badger let out a small chuckle of excitement. “I  _ love  _ Radoehead.”

Now it was my ears that perked up. “Actually?”

“Uh, yeah! Doe-K Computer is, like, one of my favorite albums of all time!”

“Holy shit! Anybody else I’ve ever heard talk about them just labels them as some weird prey band.”

“Same with me! Who thought a bunch of rabbits and some terrible mammal puns would result in such good music?”

“Believe me, I was surprised as hell when I found out those fluffballs were the ones making me orgasm through my ears.”

She actually laughed at that.

“You really found that funny? That’s not even me at my best!”

“I think you have a very distorted opinion on what your ‘best’ really is,” she gasped between chuckles.

My sly grin came back out of hiding. “I swear, this city has the worst sense of humor…”

The conversation lasted alot longer than I ever thought it would. This is the most I’ve ever talked to somebody outside of wording them into a con, and it felt...nice. A very unfamiliar feeling, but nice nonetheless. It was certainly something I could get used to. We laughed and learned more about each other for a while longer before Honey snapped back into reality and noticed the time. She began to collect her things to exit the room.

“Awwww, leaving so soon?”

“Believe it or not, Nick, I have other patients, many of them being much more quick-tempered than you, I might add. I’d rather not have any more collar related injuries to take care of.”

“Alright, alright. What’s the plan for tomorrow?”

“I suppose we get you started on physical therapy. I doubt your limbs are feeling very comfortable at the moment,” she said, smiling.

“That, my dear Honey, would be an understatement.”

The badger raised up her paws defensively. “Hold on, now! I’m just one mammal! You’re lucky I’m not having you ‘Kill Bill’ your way out of this one.

I gave her a quizzical look.

“...movie reference, Nick. I gotta bring some DVD’s in some day. You’re  _ really  _ missing out.”

“Do what you please, Hun, I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

“I suppose you’re right.” She grinned. “I see ya tomorrow.”

“Likewise.”

She left the room, but popped her head back in for one final comment.

“Don’t get used to calling me ‘Hun’, by the way. You’re lucky enough that you can call me Honey in the first place, and I could whoop your ass the second we’re off of hospital grounds.”

“Noted,” I replied.

She shut the door, leaving me back along with my thoughts.

_ Huh, I made a friend today. That’s been the first time since...I don’t know. Finnick, maybe? Is Finnick a friend? He didn’t visit at all since six months after the accident, and he might not’ve even came while Honey was in jail either. _

Through a barrage of self-questioning and pointless pessimism, I eventually drifted off to sleep.


	4. A Bit of Therapy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before I start this chapter off, I’d like to make it clear that the way I’m portraying a coma in this is completely unrealistic. I’m simply using it as a plot device, as it is commonly used in television and movies, to write the story the way I want to write it. If I was going for a more realistic depiction of a coma, Nick would practically be a vegetable once he woke up. A coma will almost never reach 3 years, and if the patient survives, speaking and skeletal coordination is near impossible.

Physical therapy fucking sucked.

Trying to move around felt kind of like attempting to run away from something in a nightmare. All movement was utterly slow and uncomfortable, there was a fair amount of falling down, and my resemblance to a sloth was near identical.

Honey estimated I’d be fully functional in the next thirty days, which of course sounded great, but it sure as hell didn’t make time go by any faster. We engaged in hours of muscle exercises every day, ranging from wiggling my fingers, to being assisted to my feet so I could walk.

Honey and I were really able to develop our relationship over this period of time. She showed some movies (Kill Bill coincidentally happened to be about someone waking up from a several year long coma after a shot to the head), and I told funny stories from my life on the streets. We listened to some music together; apparently I missed a Radoehead album release, ‘A Raccoon Shaped Pool’, while I was in the coma. She spent a lot of her time off hanging out in my room with me, leading to some very entertaining conversations.

Eventually, she started to show up without her doctors outfit on, showing off a surprising display of camouflage clothing. This was obviously an easy target for some of my lame jokes. When we became considerably comfortable talking to each other, she let her true personality shine. Away from a professional environment, she talks and acts extremely like a tomboy, letting her voice drop down and farting whenever she so pleased.

I opened up a little more, but as always, never fully showed my true emotions. No matter how close I got to someone, I decided to avoid any signs of hurt or sadness. Doing so with Judy only resulted in consequence, and I didn’t want anything like that to happen to me again.

It’d been awhile since someone voluntarily wanted to be around me, but I welcomed the new experience with open arms. Having someone to talk to about things besides business ventures was relieving to say the least.

There were still questions I never got to ask, however. Once I was recovered enough to move my arms freely and almost walk on my own, I decided to revisit what wasn’t brought up before.

...

Honey came in at seven in the morning, as usual, to feed me and get me started on my physical therapy.

“Mornin’,” she greeted as she walked into the room with my breakfast in hand.

“Ah, Honey, what a pleasant surprise! I wasn’t expecting company today, but I figure I could make the time for a bit of chit chat,” I joked.

She gave me an unimpressed look and threateningly held my food over a nearby trash can.

“Don’t make me throw out your food, Wilde.”

“Oh no! What _ever_ will I do without my daily dose of oatmeal? The lack of fiber will surely be the death of me!” I continued to pester.

The badger let out a sigh. “Why do I even bother…” She took back her empty threat and handed me my tray of food. A bowl of blueberries accompanied the larger bowl or flaky paste.

“Blueberries!” I exclaimed happily. “Oh Honey, you treat me so well.”

“What can I say, I’m a good babysitter,” she replied, smiling.

“Ya know, if you’d visited any more often, I’d begin to think you got the hots for me,” I teased, raising my eyebrows and flashing a signature smirk.

“Yeah right. I have a whole ward of burn victims that I’d rather date before going for your red-furred ass.”

I mockingly winced. “Oooo, _burn._ ” I burst out laughing, resulting in Honey struggling to hide a smile to pretend what I said didn’t amuse her.

“Nick, you really should put on a standup act. I heard Tundra Town’s humor is pretty cold and dead, so you’ll fit in there like a glove.”

“Oh come on! I really am flattered that _the_ Madge Badger, medical extraordinaire and licensed killer of comedy, wants to get with a fox like me.”

“Nah. You ain’t really my type. Besides, I’m a lesbian.”

My smirk dropped. “Oh shit, you serious?”

“Born and raised.”

“Well I guess the whole camouflage style makes a bit more sense now…”

“Shut it!”

After a few more hours of playful quips and muscle exercises, I decided to ask about the otter that questioned me when I woke up a few weeks ago.

Honey was relaxing in a chair, leaning back with her eyes on the ceiling and hind paws crossed over each other on my bed. We were silent for a while, taking a break from our session friendly insults to recuperate. I had my back leaned up against two pillows, keeping my body in an upright position, with my paws folded behind my head. I looked over at the tranquil badger.

“Hey Honey?”

“Hm?” she answered, not moving her eye position.

“Can we...talk about that otter? Daniel?” I asked.

She broke her eye contact with the ceiling above us and took her hind paws off of my bed, allowing all four legs of the chair she was on to meet the ground. She wrapped her paws together and leaned towards me, a more serious expression now etched on her face.

“What about him?”

“Why did he want to know about Judy? What’s so important about her?”  
The badger pursed her lips and looked away in thought.

“Judy’s a bit of a...target for him at the moment.” My ears perked up at this, begging to hear more. “Daniel and several other predators, myself included, are part of a resistance group to try and fight back against all of the oppression we’ve been facing the past few years. I was probably gonna tell you about it once you were well enough to get out of here, but I guess we can talk about it now instead.”

“Wait, so what does all of this have to do with Carrots?”

Honey looked back into my eyes. “After the tensions between pred and prey increased due to the fear of savage attacks, the ZPD and city hall formed a plan to make the prey specifically feel a bit more safe. They put Judy on a pedestal and promoted her as the face of the ZPD; the face of the entire prey population. She’s used as propaganda to demonstrate that no matter how weak you feel, you don’t have to let predators scare you. This made almost everybody jump on board with the segregation of us from the rest of Zootopia, and she’s still a large reason why things are staying the way they are. To make matters worse, it’s been speculated that Bellwether has taken her in to help handle with everything related to ‘keeping us under control’.”

I looked down, horrified at what that little rabbit has been doing.

_She’s stood aside and let herself be sold as some sort of role model to put shock collars on innocent mammals...I thought that what she said at that press conference was bad but this...this really is something else._

All hope to forgive her for what she’s done left my mind.

“What’s Daniel planning to do?”

Honey raised her arm and scratched the back of her neck, appearing nervous to reveal what the otter’s been up to.

“Kidnap her, blackmail her, anything that can be used to shift her public image to make preds appear less dangerous. It won’t solve anything, but it gets rid a huge problem.

“And if she doesn’t cooperate?” I said, moving my gaze back to her. She immediately attempted to avoid it, staying silent as she did.

“Honey?”

The badger took a deep breath. “We um...take her out.”

This was a lot to take in. I was still recovering from what Judy said about my biology, and despite what she’s supposedly done to further separate predators from prey, I could never imagine ending her life. Some part of me, although unable to forgive, still saw a shred of genuine good in the bunny.

“B-but it’s last resort!” Honey stuttered. “The main thing we’re trying to avoid is stooping down to their level. There’s no way to end violence with violence, but some things just have to be done.” She looked back in my eyes, a determined expression replacing the look of panic. “That’s why he needed you. He’s trying to find a way get through to her without the use of anything drastic.”

I simply nodded my head in agreement, looking down at my paws that were unknowingly clenching the blankets on top of me.

She sat there for a few more seconds before collecting herself and getting out of her seat. “I should probably leave you alone for a bit…”

I let her get halfway to the door before attempting to ask one final question.

“Wait.” She turned around and looked at me, her eyes filled with a sadness I haven’t seen since she talked about the collars.

“The night that I was...shot...there were these people. They were wearing these blank, white masks, and I think they were after me because I’m a predator.” Honey’s collar flashed yellow at the mention of the group, but I continued. “Are they still around?”

She lowered her eyes, suddenly finding great interest in her intertwined paws.

“Yes,” she finally said. “They call themselves ‘The Purifiers’, and they’re not gonna be too happy if they find out they let one of their victims live…”

* * *

 

Slowly but surely I reached the point where I was able to walk around without any sort of assistance. Honey crushed my spirits by pointing out my similarities to a toddler on their legs for the first time, but all criticism aside I felt great. The only problem was figuring out what I'd do once I left the hospital.

During my stay, Honey explained the conditions predators are forced to live in since segregation was enforced. We live in a main district by the name of ‘Happytown’, practically the equivalent of the slums that my mother lived in. There's near constant supervision from prey members of the ZPD, all of which have remote controls to activate the collars of the nearest threat. Preds aren't allowed outside past 10 at night unless if they have a special work permit, or they're being escorted by a licensed prey citizen. The type of work that predators are allowed to occupy, nighttime or day, is limited to public service and factory employment. Pay is kept to a bare minimum, and health coverage is near nonexistent.

Having lived under a bridge for the better half of my life, I figured I'd be able to survive without too much of a struggle. There were a few problems I had to consider, however. The main targets for most cons I pulled off were prey. It's not like I actively avoided cheating predators out of their hard earned cash, but considering the situation everybody was in, it didn't feel right to take away any of the little they had.

My next thought was to take my business back to the center of Zootopia, but I was informed by Honey that, although not illegal to go there, predators were highly frowned upon when mixed into the prey community. The only reasons any preds traveled there for was solely for work related, and even then, being seen the wrong way could result in a violent end.

Something else I had to plan ahead for was my lack of a collar. Being caught without wearing one could result in an array of different possible outcomes; ranging from jail time to physical punishment. That left me with the choice of turning myself in for an indelible collar, or living in hiding with the chances of much greater consequences. The former could take away my emotional freedom, and the latter could take away my physical freedom.

Honey offered to let me stay in her house, an offer of which I gladly accepted, until I had everything figured out. It was too dangerous to go back to my makeshift home and gather the few belongings I had, so I was out of money and out of luck. Honey really was a saint.

…

Just released from the hospital, Honey took the rest of her day off to walk me to her apartment and show me around. Due to the low pred population and lack of medical funds, Honey’s job was left with much more free time than any ordinary doctor.

The sun rays beamed down on me ferociously, causing me to sweat and pant profusely. This only left me to wonder the extreme discomfort of all predators formerly living in Tundra Town. My recently acquired badger friend trudged along right by my side, standing nearly just as tall as me. I gazed along the apartments packed together like sardines in a crushed tin box. The image of unfilled potholes, garbage covered sidewalks, and the putrid smell of the neighborhood brought back awful memories of my unfortunate visit to my mother all those years ago.

_I wonder how she's holding up...does she even know what happened to me?_

To avoid my questions that I thought would never be answered, I decided to converse with Honey to clear the air.

“So you're apart of that predator the resistance group?” I asked.

Honey shrugged in response. “I'm not exactly an active member, per se, but I take time to attend meeting and communicate with Daniel and some others.”

“Oh…”

…

…

…

“...any chance I could join in?”

The badger snuck a look in my direction to make sure it was actually me that asked the question. “Let's just worry about getting you inside without the cops busting your ass for not wearing a collar.”

“Fair enough.”

We walked in silence for a few more minutes before Honey led me into a small brick complex. We stayed on the first floor and took the first door on the right from the incoming hallway.

“Welcome to La Casa de Badger!” she said sarcastically.

There was a small bedroom and a smaller kitchen. Happytown wasn't really doing much to avoid reminding me of my broken maternal relationship. Worn out band posters were strung up against the walls, many covering up cracks in the drywall. Stained camouflage bedsheets covered a mattress that wasn't any more boast worthy than the bed I had under the bridge. A pile of similarly colored bras covered the floor, a sight I couldn't draw my eyes away from.

Honey clearly noticed my infatuation. “Yeah, wasn't exactly prepared for company, but ya know. Home sweet home and all that jazz. If you don't like it, the door’s right there.”

I gave the apartment another quick inspection before replying. “I think I can suffer your strange obsession with army-style clothing for a little while.”

“Mmhm. That's what I thought. Well, I guess you can take the couch, unless you were eyeing my bras for sleeping purposes,” she joked.

“Couch it is.”

As Honey set up a blanket and pillow for me on my new bed, I decided to check out the small rest of the house I hadn't already seen. I cracked open the fridge to see if I could nab some food while the badger’s back was turned. There was a lot of cheese.

“Fuck, Honey, got anything in here that isn't dairy?”

“Uh- ya just open up the first drawer from the bottom.”

My paw slipped under the the plastic handle and opened up the designated drawer. There were a lot of bags filled with some sort of yellow and black insect…

“Shit! Honey are these bees? How do you eat this?” I asked in disgust.

Honey had finished setting up my bed and had joined me in the kitchen. She slapped a paw on my shoulder, much harder than one would expect a small badger to slap.

“Well, Nick, you said it yourself. Honey badgers really don't give a shit…”

…

“I'm going to have such a good time living with you, Hun.”

The badger practically pummeled me to the ground for calling her such a name.

…

Sitting around while Honey was at work was nearly as boring as lying immobile in a hospital bed. Her apartment had almost nothing to entertain me with, aside from some CD’s I'd already overplayed before my gun-related accident, and I wasn't able to go outside without wearing a collar. Well, I was, it just probably wouldn't end too well for me if what Honey was saying about the prey law enforcement was true.

I leaned my head back on my couch/bed and blew out some separated bursts of air in boredom.

_Okay, Honey gets back at...10 at night. It's currently…_

I checked my watch.

_9:30 in the morning…I have to live like this every day until I figure out my collar situation? And I only have bees and cheese to eat? Put me back in a fucking coma._

I tried the bees the night before. They still sting after they die. Pesky bastards…

_Okay okay. You can make it through this. You survived the nagging of an annoying bunny for two days straight while in constant danger, so you can definitely survive this. Then again, I was kinda forced into that fiasco against my will._

I looked over at the door that brought me into the apartment.

_Nothing too bad could happen if I go outside, right? I'm sly, I'm clever, I've avoided cops for the better half of my existence, I doubt that walking around would do much harm._

_But then again, that was three years ago. If Honey’s telling the truth, those cops won’t hesitate to kill you if they find you to be a threat. It would be the safer choice to sit around till Honey gets home._

_But I'm soooooooo boooooooored. And there's nothing good to eat! A fox can't survive like this!_

_You've just survived a gunshot to the head. Don't waste your second chance at life for the avoidance of a few hours of boredom._

_Correction, 12 hours of boredom. Where'd you learn to do math, the streets?_

_I'm you, idiot, and we did learn math on the streets._

_Oh yeah…_

“Fuck, I'm hearing voices in my head now!” I'm complained aloud. “This is like those cliché angel and devil on the shoulders tropes…”

_Hey! I'm just trying to get you to have some fun is all. Goodie-goodie over here would rather sit around and eat bumblebees._

_I'm_ trying _to avoid us getting_ killed _, thank you very much. If Nick has any common sense, he'd listen to me._

_You clearly don't know Nick then…_

“Devil voice is right,” I agreed. “I think I'll take the risk.”

I started blocking out any signs of my religious insanity from my head and made my way to the door. My paw gripped the knob when I realized that I'd be detained the moment an officer sees me, and they were probably roaming the streets 24/7. I stood in thought for a moment before an idea came to mind…

I did my best to clearly picture what Honey’s collar looked like, and I searched the tiny home to find any items that would at all resemble it. I found a small velcro strap on the ground, and although it was camoflauge, I figured it'd do for the time being. Now for the electric box…

I inspected every inch of Honey’s bedroom before moving on to the kitchen. After looking on top of the counters and coming up with nothing, I decided to check under the sink. I opened the cabinet doors to be met with the smell of dust and mold. There was some cleaning detergent and the pipes from the sink above, but still, nothing that looked like the desired part of the collar. I leaned into the sink, suffering the dust particles attacking my sensitive nose. My eyes adjusted to the dark quickly, and I saw something rather interesting.

The latch to a steel door, something you'd find on top of a war bunker or something. Some of the dust that formed around the handle was cleared in the shape of paw prints. Someone had been in here quite recently.

_The outside world can wait a little while longer, I guess._

I opened up the mysterious passage under the sink and climbed in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ‘Radoehead’ refers to ‘Radiohead’ if you didn’t get the reference (‘Doe-K Computer’ is ‘OK Computer’ as well. Fabulous album, check it out).


	5. Panic in the Panic Room

I found out that Honey was a little bit on the crazy side.

I climbed down into a panic room filled with canned foods and crumpled pieces of paper. A large map of Zootopia was hung up on the wall, with multiple push pins and lengths of string highlighting specific areas of the city. Photos of multiple different sheep littered the rest of the walls of the bunker, some with giant red exes drawn over their faces.

I looked around in awe, wondering why Honey would have such a place under her sink, until my eye caught something rather interesting.

A tv.

_Well, well, well. Looks like my entertainment problem is solved!_

I burrowed myself in a comfortable beanbag chair and spent the next several hours watching reruns of sitcoms and snacking on canned corn and pasta. I’ve never had much access to a television before, so the experience was rather new to me, but it was fun nonetheless. The sitcom’s humor was bland, not enough sarcasm or puns for my taste, but it passed the time, and was certainly much better than lying on a couch eating bees until Honey got home.

I dozed off while watching an episode of ‘ _Fur_ riends’, but was soon awoken by the distant sound of a door shutting. My eyes shot open.

“Nick! Where are you?” I heard the badger call from the floor above.

_Crap…_

I hopped off of the beanbag and dusted off any food that could’ve been sticking to my shirt. A clump of marinara sauce stained itself into my pants, but I didn’t have enough time to worry about appearance at the moment. I swung myself up the ladder that led me into the strange room and pushed open the door to the dusty area under the sink. I opened the cabinet.

Honey was busy looking around her apartment, looking slightly nervous. Her collar was lit yellow. She turned at the sudden noise from the kitchen and widened her eyes in shock.

“Nice place you got here, Honey. I dig the sort of ‘home away from home’ vibe ya got going on. Could do without all the sheep posters, though.”

I smirked at the dumbstruck badger, half of my body still under the sink. I rested my chin up on my paw. “Have anything you’d care to explain?”

Honey’s paws clenched together in a brief moment of fury before she let out a sigh. The light on her collar turned back to its steady green.

She pinched the bridge of her nose in annoyance, eyes fluttering shut. “Might as well go back in the panic room. It’s comfier down there, anyway.”

I scurried out from my current resting place, shaking the dust off my fur, and gestured both my paws to the steel latch. “After you, my lady.”

Honey stomped past me, forcefully grabbing my ear as she made her way under the sink. I was nearly thrown off-balance, and had to stick close to her to avoid having it ripped clean off.

“Ow! Honey, hands off the merchandise! The girls love these ears!” I complained.

The badger let go of my ear to use both of her paws to lower herself down the ladder. “Oh please,” she mocked. “You’ve got a face only a mother could love.”

I ignored the comment as she made her way into the bunker, me not following too far behind. I jumped the ladder three rungs to the ground and turned to see Honey with her hands on her hips.

“Nick, this food is for emergencies only,” she scolded, pointing to the several empty cans scattered across the floor. I raised up my paws in defense.

“Uh, ya. It was an emergency. I can guarantee you’re the only person in Zootopia that lives solely off of bumblebees and cheese. I was starving up there!”

Honey rolled her eyes at my lame excuse for stealing her food.

“How’d you find this place, anyway?”

“I’m not really one for doing absolutely nothing for hours on end, so I was looking for supplies to make a mock collar. I was simply _itching_ to explore the so appropriately named Happytown.”

She threw up her arms in protest. “You can’t go outside at all! If the ZPD finds you without a real collar on they’ll- they’ll… I don’t even know what they’ll do!” Her collar turned yellow again, her face showing genuine concern. I dropped my sarcastic act and moved closer to her.

“Hey, Honey, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I won’t go outside unless you’re fully aware of it and it’s one-hundred percent safe to do so.”

She crossed her arms and looked up at me. “You promise?”

“I promise.”

She started to chew her inner cheek. “Alright…” She went to lean her back against the nearest wall and crossed her legs, collar going back to normal. “Take a seat.”

I complied, returning back to the beanbag that still had my body’s indentation etched into it.

“Sooooooo,” I started as I sat down. “Sheep, huh?”

“What? Oh, yeah. They’re trying to take over Zootopia.”

I couldn’t help but smile, and looked up at her. She had her eyes on the ceiling. “...right. And how are they doing that?”

She stared at me in curiosity. “You really haven’t noticed? There are signs everywhere! They sneak messages into the news, they’re linked to all organized crime in Zootopia, their mayor even put the collars on all of us predators!”

My smile dropped when I realized she was serious about her conspiracy theories. “Okay, I can’t disagree with you about that last one, but the rest of what you said is ridiculous. Sheep aren’t taking over Zootopia.”

“Yes they are!” she retaliated. “They’re gonna start a war!”

“Is this speciesism? Are you a specist?”

“This has nothing to do with species. I look at the facts, and all of the facts point to evil in the sheep population.”

“...so you’re a specist.”

“I can’t argue about this with you. Nobody’s gonna win.”

I nodded my head. “Can’t disagree with you on that one.” I looked around the room once again. “So this place is for when…”

“The sheep attack,” she finished.

“Right. Of course.” I looked back at her with pleading eyes. “Could it also be my bedroom by any chance?”

Honey returned my eye contact and sighed. “Fiiiiiiiiiine,” she agreed in irritation.

I snapped my fingers and pointed at the badger, flashing a smile. “You’re the best, Hun.”

Her face morphed into a scowl.

“Uh- Honey! I meant Honey!”

“That’s what I thought…”

…

We spent much of the night watching tv in relaxation, for the most part in silence. I paused to send a few quips or point out continuity errors at the screen, but aside from that, we didn’t do too much talking. Must’ve been a long day for Honey.

I was still in my newly favored beanbag chair, and Honey was lying to the side of me, her head rested upon the same chair I was in. I was scrolling through the upcoming shows on the television guide when I saw a movie that interested me.

“Hey Honey? There’s a movie on at midnight called ‘The Room’. Is it any good?”

“It’s hilarious,” she replied, “but for all the wrong reasons...wait did you say midnight?”

“Yep.”

“What time is it now?” she asked urgently.

“Uhhhh.” I checked my watch. “11:54.”

“It’s Thursday today, right?”

“Nah, I think it’s Friday.”

Honey shot up from her position. “Oh, fuck me!” she yelled.

I took the chance to make light of the situation. “You sure? I thought you said you’re a lesbian.”

“Shut it, Wilde, now’s not the time!” She went into a storage closet in the side of the room and came back out holding a foldup table. “Do me a solid and grab four chairs from in the closet, will ya.”

“Will there be a reward? I’m no petty-”

“NOW!”

I found myself hurrying to the closet Honey was referring to and grabbed four foldup chairs, just as she asked. I figured she’d like me to set them up around the table, so I did that as well.

“So what’s going on?” I pestered. “Is this some sort of neighborhood welcoming party to celebrate my induction into the House of Honey?”

“Nuh uh. You’re staying upstairs,” she answered, in a tone that suggested that what she said was final.

“What? Why? I promise I won’t embarrass you!” I put my right paw over my heart and held my left halfway up into the air. “Scout’s honor.”

“It’s not that, Nick, I have a meeting I have to take care of.”

“A meeting? Why do you have a-” I left my jaw hanging open when I came to a realization. “Wait, for that resistance group thing? You have these in your house?”

“Yeah, now go upstairs.”

“I thought you said you weren't really an active member!” I continued. “I'd say that having these meetings in the comfort of your own panic room is far from an ‘inactive member’.”

“Nick, I really don't have time for this. Will you just shut up and go upstairs so I can get this over with?”

“Nuh uh, I'm staying here,” I protested with determination. I crossed my arms and cemented myself to the spot I was standing in.

“Nick, I promise we'll talk about this later, but for now can you please just leave us alone?”

“I was shot in the head by-, what was it? The Purifiers? Just for being a predator. I have every right to be here. Besides, you need any more info on Officer TootToot, I’d be more than happy to lend a paw.”

The badger opened her mouth to retaliate, but I cut her off, waving a finger in the air. “Not done. Do you really expect me to just sit upstairs while you’re talking with your resistance friends about committing treason? They’d see me when they walk in anyway!”

Honey grunted in frustration. “It’s not that I don’t think you shouldn’t be here, Nick, it’s just that we can’t simply let you join without discussing it first; and you didn’t exactly convince Daniel of your reliability…”

A distant knocking could be heard from the door to the badger’s apartment.

“Fuck!” Honey yelled, stomping a foot on the ground. “Go open the door…”

“Will do!” I complied, giving her a two-fingered salute. I headed up the ladder, listening to Honey curse under her breath as I did. I hopped out from under the sink, holding back a sneeze that threatened to come out due to the dust, and made my over to the door.

I paused to adjust my tie, just then realizing that the clothes I’d been wearing have spent three years sitting around while I was in a coma. The stain from the pasta sauce was still clearly visible on my pants.

_Welp, not like I need to look presentable in front of that asshole otter anyways…_

A second knock at the door snapped me out of my thoughts. I quickly swung the door open to see Daniel, bearing a similar outfit to the one when he interrogated me. His two wolf buddies, Huskins and Houndinski, towered behind the otter, looking more like bodyguards than actual members of the group. Daniel looked up at me, eyes widening, and let out a sound of disgust.

“You…” he growled.

“Me!” I confirmed.

…

“Does he really have to be here?” Daniel protested as he paced across the table Honey set up. Clearly this otter has some sort of fixation with walking all over things…

“No,” the badger responded, shooting me an angry glare, “but he _insisted._ ” She squeezed out the words through her teeth as she spoke, filling me with genuine fear.

“Is this not the Badger Book Club?” I asked. “Am I in the wrong place? I just wanted to converse about Harry Otter is all!”

Honey rolled her eyes. “Nick, if you wanna stay here, at least try to act serious.” She took a seat in the chair closer to her, causing the two wolves and otter to follow suit. There were only four places at the table.

“Well fine. I wanted the beanbag chair anyway,” I said matter-of-factly. I pulled the seat as close as possible and plopped down. Due to the low stature of the beanbag, my eyes were left just level with the top of the table.

“Alright, so I clearly caught you two at a bad time, so let’s makes this quick so I can get out of your fur,” Daniel started, cutting straight to the point.

Honey narrowed her eyes at the otter. “What do you mean by ‘a bad time’?” she questioned.

“I suspect it’s not common hospital regulation to move a patient to your own living quarters...unless if something more _intimate_ is taking place.”

“Oh for the love of God!” Honey complained, slapping a paw to her forehead. “I’m gay! You all know that!”

“I figured you’d made an exception…”

“Just cut to the chase already! What do you have planned for Hopps?”

“Oh.” Daniel looked down in embarrassment. “I really have no clue…”

Honey’s face fell. “Please fucking tell me you’re joking.”

The otter avoided Honey’s gaze, committed to staying silent. This badger really intimidates everyone…

Honey suddenly lurched up, the chair falling and clattering behind her. Her collar burst into a shade of yellow as she held her paws behind her head, pressing her arms against the side of her face. She strutted over to the corner of the bunker, swearing under her breath as she did. I watched in interest from the comfort of my unreasonably low sitting position. This version of Honey that I’ve been seeing the past few days has been such a contrast from what I was introduced to when I woke up at the hospital. The seemingly tame, well-mannered badger had such a temper when away from work.

 _Maybe it’s because this really matters to her...after all, she_ has _been wearing that collar for years now. It must put such a restraint on her life; she’d do whatever it takes to get out of it._

My eyebrows shot diagonally in frustration.

_Honey has shown me nothing but care and hospitality since the day that she met me. The least she deserves is to live in a fair society, but this dipshit otter can’t even give her a little bit of hope for some emotional freedom. That fucking interrogation was all for nothing!_

Honey burst me out of my thoughts, and as if reading my mind, supported my case against Daniel.

“What have you been doing for the past month, asshole?” she spit at the otter. He immediately flinched at the sharp insult. “The only thing you’ve been going on about since you found out Wilde here,” she held a paw out in my direction, “survived The Purifiers was ‘Oh, that fox _surely_ knows how to take out that dumb little bunny. Once he wakes up and gives us some inside knowledge, we’ll _definitely_ have the resources to get one step closer to equality.’” She used a snotty voice to portray Daniel’s better-than-you tone, making a smirk form upon my lips. It quickly went away once the badger continued with her rant.

“But no! I’ve been nursing this damn fox back to health while you had _a whole fucking month_ to at the very least get _somewhere_ with what he told you.” My ears pressed back against my head at her insulting referral of me. “But _no_ , you have _nothing!_ You’ve gotten absolutely nowhere with your supposed ‘breakthrough’ that you said would make a sizable dent in our oppression. Fucking nowhe-”

Honey was sharply cut off mid-sentence when a loud buzz echoed itself around the thick walls of the panic room. She shot backwards, clearly taken by surprise at the burst of pain, slamming in the concrete behind her and crumbling to the floor, leaving a sliver of blood where her head made contact. Huskins and Houndinski stood up in fear, and Daniel shrunk back into his chair.

“Honey!” I cried out. I stumbled out of my seat and ran to her side, trying to assess the damage. The shock seemed much worse than the one I had witnessed back in the ICU. I smelled her singed fur from wear she was so violently shocked, and a small blotch of blood matted the fur on the back of her head.

Honey raised a paw to where she collided with the wall, her eyes widening when she brought it back and saw the crimson liquid.

_BZZRT_

Her paws zoomed to her neck, clutching the collar that once again electrocuted her.

“Shit, Honey, calm down!” The badger attempted to take a few raspy breaths, before convulsing once again as more waves of pain ran throughout her body. She was having a panic attack.

Sadly, this wouldn’t be the first time I’d had to deal with something such as this. I’d gotten used to seeing panic attacks, and had grown to recognize all possible warning signs. Shortened breath, expression of terror, increased heart rate, extreme anxiety; Honey was definitely suffering from one.

When I was younger, before I ran away from home, my dad used to come home nearly every night, dead drunk, and threatened my mom for hours on end. I usually stayed in my room and kept quiet to avoid any abuse myself, but from what I heard, there was probably hitting involved. My dad left the house right after, as if nothing happened, leaving my mom lying on the floor, overwhelmed by stress. I was the only one there to comfort her when she had panic attacks, and had developed a routine to deal with such a situation.

One day my dad didn’t come home, and stayed away ever since. Whether he just didn’t want to come home, or he was dead, I didn’t care, I was just worried about my mom. She kept having panic attacks frequently despite my father being gone, and my activity on the streets grew and grew. Eventually her stress died down, and that’s when she gave me an ultimatum to clean up or get out. I figured she didn’t need me any more, and I thought I didn’t need her, so I left her just like my old man. I still can’t tell if I regretted that decision of not...

But I was here for Honey now. She was scared beyond belief. She’d recounted those stories of mammals who are so caught up in fear that they reach an endless cycle of electrocution until they inevitably died; and she’d dealt with people who went through that first hand. Now she thought it’d happen to her.

I had to calm her down, or she wouldn’t be around for much longer.

“Okay Honey,” I said in the most tranquil voice I could muster, “you gotta focus on me. Look into my eyes, don’t think about anything else, just look at me, okay?”

The badger let a few tears slide down her face and turned her eyes to mine.

_BZZRT_

She extended her legs out, screaming. The sheer force she put on her collar only caused another shock out of protest. The badger continued to hyperventilate. Keeping a blank expression, I took her paws into mine to avoid any more incidents.

“Stay with me, Honey. You can get through this.” I ignored the blood being transferred to my paws as I rubbed hers for comfort. “Raise your arms over your head and try to slow down your breathing, okay? Can you do that for me?” She choked back a sob and hurriedly nodded. She rose her shaking paws into the air, and attempted to get her breathing under control.

“Good job. You’re doing great, Honey. Keep your arms up and look at me.” Once again, she moved her glossy eyes to meet mine. I tried to maintain the most consoling appearance possible. “Do you need anything? Water? Tea?”

“Wa-wa...ter,” she made out in between gasps.

I looked behind me at the motionless spectators. When none of them left to meet Honey’s request, I desperately flicked my head towards the ladder. Daniel got the memo, and snapped his fingers at the black-furred wolf to go get the water. When Houndinski was out of sight, I turned back to the badger.

“Now, what I need you to do is concentrate on your breathing and count to ten with me, okay? You’re doing great, Honey,” I repeated.

We’d made it to seven, Honey barely pronouncing any of the words audibly, when Houndinski hurried back down with a tall glass of water. He handed it to me, and I promptly handed it to her.

“Drink slowly, take a break if you need to. Make sure you’re getting enough air.” She nodded her head in confirmation before taking a few small sips of the water, sighing in relief once it washed down her throat. Her breaths steadily became less raspy and more controlled.

...

After nearly half an hour of me helping her cope, she carefully got to her feet and looked at the three others in the room, all of which hadn’t moved an inch since Honey had gotten her drink.

“You should probably all leave…” she said quietly. The two wolves were quick to get out of the bunker. Daniel stayed behind a few seconds, staring at Honey with a guilty expression, before turning to follow his friends.

“Daniel,” Honey spoke up once he reached the ladder.

He turned, ears perked up.

“Call me tomorrow. We’re not done here.”

The otter gave her an uneasy nod before leaving the room.

Honey continued to glare at the ladder, as if expecting one of the mammals to return. I stood up from my crouching position, intending to leave the badger alone. When I passed her by she grabbed me by the arm.

“You’re staying with me, Wilde.” I met her gaze, silently agreeing to her order. She grabbed a bandage from a nearby first-aid kit (this badger had _everything_ down here) and led me over to the beanbag chair, forcing me to squish up next to her in the seat meant to fit one mammal.

After she patched up her wound, we sat there in silence for quite a while, our heads brushing up against each other as we relaxed.

“Thank you,” Honey whispered, breaking the quiet. I turned my head towards her, giving her a smile.

“You shouldn’t be thanking me. I’m part of the reason that happened,” I replied.  

“Don’t blame this on yourself, Nick. You had every reason to stay for that meeting. It was Daniel that fucked up, not you.”

“Ya but...my sorry attempts at jokes were pissing you off though, right?”

Honey closed her eyes and thought for a moment. “I mean, yeah, but you were just trying to make light of the situation. It was a friendly sort of pissed off, if that makes any sense.”

“I guess it does.”

…

“It’s really late. You gotta wake up early tomorrow. Go get some sleep.”

Honey let out a long sigh. “Okay.” She tiredly got out of her position, making me fold over onto the sudden hole that was left in the cushion.

“Good night,” she muttered, trudging to the exit. Her feet barely made any noise against the solid ground as she walked.

I made a split-second decision at that moment.

“Wait.”

She turned her head to me. “Hm?”

I cleared my throat, preparing myself for what I was about to suggest.

“I wanna get a collar tomorrow. I need to speak to my mom.”


	6. Collars and Hares

“What I’m _saying_ is you better get your _fucking_ act together or that _fucking_ shock collar will be the least of your _fucking_ worries!”

I glanced my half-lidded eyes over to the furious badger pacing around the room, phone in hand. My head was propped up against the armrest, giving me a perfect view of storm.

“Jeez, Honey, you kiss your mother with that mout?” I so insightfully asked.

She ignored my asinine comment, focusing purely on the otter on the other side of the receiver. I made out the muffled voice of someone through the speaker of Honey’s phone, Honey’s face growing more and more twisted with irritation with each passing word.

“We don’t have time for this, Daniel! You’ve been saying more than anyone that _this_ was the time to fight back, and yet you don’t even have a fucking plan! You brought a butter knife to a gunfight, man.”

My attention turned over to the yellow flicker of light that rested just atop of Honey’s restricted neck.

 _This badger_ really _doesn’t know much about calming down, huh? Good thing ‘ol Nick Wilde is here to brighten her mood!_

“Honey you better put that glow on your collar to rest. We don’t want a repeat of last night, do we?”

Honey turned to me, desperately holding on to the rage that she had in order to talk some sense into the otter. She ultimately failed, however, giving in to my request for tranquility. Her expression softened, and her breathing soothed to a much more normal rate.

She waited for Daniel to finish what he had to say before taking a deep breath and speaking in a much softer tone. The yellow blended back into its neutral green.

“Don’t speak to me until you have this figured out.” Without looking, she lifted the device away from her ear and tapped the hangup button. She ran a paw through the fur on her head, trying to diminish the overwhelming stress that was visibly eating away at her.

“I gotta call you in before you go out to get your collar. We don’t want any cops getting the wrong ideas. They’ll probably send an escort over here to drive you over to a clinic in Zootopia, and from then on, you’re as good as gold...metaphorically speaking.” She seemed somewhat disappointed by the way she was speaking. It was as if she let something bad happen when she had the control to stop it.

My arm dropped down from the side of the couch to the carpet below me, and started drawing circles in the fabric.

“Don’t worry about me, Honey,” I assured. “This is _my_ choice. If there are consequences, let there be consequences, but just know that none of this will ever be your fault.” I was facing my weirdly infatuating interactions with the rug, avoiding Honey’s gaze for the sake of my own comfort. It always made me feel so weird to say something serious without dropping _some_ hint of light-heartedness. For the past month, Honey’s certainly been challenging me on my fears of being open.

Honey’s arms dropped down to her sides in hopelessness. “I know, Nick. It’s just- just that you’re under my care at the moment, and I’m still allowing you to do this. I don’t think you realize how limiting and torturous these things really are.”

“I bet I don’t, but I’m gonna have to face it some day. I can’t just hide out in your loony-bunker for the rest of my life just because some jackass preys don’t want me getting too excited.”

“I- Nick, look at me,” she demanded. I flicked my eyes upwards at the pitiful badger standing before, pleading me to go through with her appeal. “You don’t want to live like this.”

Once I was certain she was finished speaking, I once again returned to my fiddling with the carpet.

“Honey, have I ever talked to you about my mother?”

I was met with silence, making it clear that we hadn’t previously touched upon the subject.

“I learned at a young age that foxes were to do what’s expected of them. Whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, I was convinced I had to follow those expectations no matter what.” The pads on my fingers ditched the concept of drawing circles to outline squares instead. “What that meant was foxes were expected to be shifty and deceiving. I did exactly that. Ever since I was about eight years old, I followed these trends, scamming kids at school out of their desserts from their lunches. Things grew, and eventually the sweets turned into money; but the money wasn’t enough. Foxes are supposed to do so much more than that. So, I switched from scamming to stealing.

I was never caught by anyone who cared enough to turn me in, but sadly, one of the people that _did_ catch me was my mom. She was not happy to say the least. She told me that either I quit the shady lifestyle or leave her home. I bet you can guess which one I chose.” I paused to see if Honey had anything to pitch in, but upon hearing nothing, I continued. I switched from drawing squares to triangles.

“One day I was caught up in a robbery gone wrong. I’d rather not get too much into detail, but it guided me away from doing anything illegal in the future. I turned back to cons, and although it didn’t bring in as much cash as I would like, it got the job done. As long as a fox was doing what a fox should, the public didn’t bat an eye, and neither did I.

Anyways, I decided to track my mother down fourteen years after I left her. I forget the reason...I don’t even know if there _was_ a reason, but I did it anyway. One thing led to another, and my profession was brought up. She was relieved that I wasn’t messing with the law anymore, but still wasn’t satisfied with what I was doing. She thought I could be more than a fox...I don’t understand how she was able to say that and genuinely mean it at the same time. I knew- I know that a fox can’t be anything else, and this shitstorm that all predators are in only leaves us with less wiggle room for who we want to be.” I forgot about all efforts to form shapes in Honey’s floor and settled on just sketching random squiggles.

“I just couldn’t handle it. I was too self-centered to notice that my mom’s been worrying about the wellbeing of her son for over a decade...and I left her again. I left her twice. That was 6 years ago, 9 if you count the coma. I don’t think she’s got much time left, and I gotta settle things before it’s too late.” My paw finally quit its efforts to become an artist on the floor of the badger’s dumpy apartment. I looked up at Honey to see her reaction to my lengthy dramafest.

She hadn’t moved since the last time I looked at her, her gaze still fixated deadcenter on my face. I kept my mouth shut, hinting that I was done recounting my past.

Honey sighed, using her fingers to flip the phone around in her paw. “I’ll call you in. I gotta head over to the hospital. They’ll probably be here in a half hour.” She pointed an accusing finger in my direction. “ _No funny business_ . They do _not_ take collarless preds lightly.”

* * *

 

They arrived in an hour and a half.

Honey was long gone, leaving me alone in the apartment, tediously awaiting the mammals that would take me to forfeit my emotional liberty. I found myself pacing, something I hadn’t done for quite a while. It had been some time since I’d been so nervous for something, especially something that I decided to do willingly. On one paw, wearing that god forsaken collar looked like pure hell, but on the other paw, I hadn’t seen my mother for 9 years. I couldn’t be cooped up in this house for the rest of my days. I didn’t want to live my life like my mom had…

A sharp rapping on the door pulled me away from my thoughts. I could feel the vibrations of the knocking course through the room. The hinges on the door struggled to remain intact.

_These people clearly don’t have too much respect for the wellbeing of inanimate objects…_

I brushed a paw across the back of my neck, blew out a breath of air and headed over to greet the lovely mammal waiting outside.

Or...mammal _s_...as I should’ve said.

A stern looking hippo, and an even sterner looking elephant stood behind a surprisingly tall hare. The hare rose about a foot taller than me, still very short when compared to the animals accompanying him, but tall nonetheless. The three of them all bore a buttoned, black uniform with a ‘Predator Control’ label stamped plainly on the front. The hare held what seemed like a tranquilizer in his right paw. Out of curiosity, I looked behind him to see if the other two were holding anything to be concerned about.

Of course I couldn’t catch a break. The hippo was holding a muzzle (just my luck) and the elephant had a…I didn’t immediately recognize what the elephant was holding.

His hand gripped a long steel pole with a rough-looking wire in the shape of a noose at the end. A shorter wire ran from the other end and wrapped itself around the elephant’s wrist, as if to keep it from slipping off.

“Nicholas Wilde?” the hare piped up. I quickly shot my glance in his direction. His expression represented a strange mixture of disgust and boredom; and he spoke with a strong Australian accent.

_How typical. An Australian hare._

“Present,” I responded, half-raising a paw.

The hare cleared his throat and stood up straight, avoiding looking at me in the eyes to inspect the messy apartment behind me. The face of disgust started to outweigh the boredom.

Like he’d done it a thousand times before, he started to address me. “For the safety of yourself and all citizens of Zootopia, you are required by the Official Predator Circumscription Act to wear a correctional collar at all times. We will escort you to the nearest containment facility, and during such time you will be under high restraint and surveillance to ensure the security of all mammals involved in said escort. Inability to comply to all demands of either me or my colleagues can and will result in legal action and possible force. Over the period of time that you are in our presence, any suspicious or dangerous behavior instigated by yourself, either by choice or by biology, will be responded to with any means necessary. This includes but is not limited to: a concentrated dose of anti-predatory tranquilizer, the removal of your claws, or euthanization. Do you understand these conditions as I have stated them to you, and do you agree to oblige to all and everything we ask of you?”

_Shit, this hare ain’t playing around._

I briskly nodded my head, summoning a smile from the mammal in front of me.

“Good.” He slouched back down from his soldier-like stature and turned to looked at the animals behind him. “Let’s get dis little shit over to the shock clinic fast. Da Hooves game is on in two hours, and I ‘aven’t ‘ad da fuckin’ chance to get any dip for my chips.” He dropped his professional facade, letting his less than comprehensible accent take over.

The hare turned back to look at me. “And if dere’s one fing I fucking ‘ate more dan any of you collarless chompers, it’s dipless chips. So,” he clapped his paws together. “‘ow ‘bout we get dis show on the road, eh?”

The hippo ducked under the door frame to get into the room and walked behind me, every footstep making the floor give an uneasy creak.

“Show?” I smirked. “If I remember correctly, my Animalia concert tickets haven’t gone for sale as of yet.” I half-lidded my eyes and shrugged. “But I suppose I can make an exception for a fine fella such as yourself. I’ve certainly got enough material to last me a few hours.”

The hare gave a short chuckle. “Well well well…” He laced his paws behind his back and paced around me, using our height difference to his advantage by looking down upon me. “We got a jokester ‘ere, mates!” Now standing to my right, he forcefully snatched by muzzle and held it shut, pulling my face up towards him so we were looking at each other eye to eye. I could see orange and green specks of food in his teeth as he spoke.

“I fot foxes only used dese big mouths fer ripping apart ‘elpless little bunnies. Way to prove me wrong!” He grinned at his friends around him. “Looks like we get to collar a pred, _and_ we get some entertainment on the side, boys! Football and dip can wait, I’m gonna ‘ave a _fucking field day_ wif dis chomper.” He directed his glare to the hippo beside him. “Tony! Muzzle dis bad boy up!”

Any amusement that was I had visible at that moment was swept away. With the hare’s paw still clutching my mouth shut, I managed to refuse.

“‘ou’re not ‘onna ‘ut that fu-ing muzzle on me.”

The hare turned back to me. “What’d ya say, fox?” I stayed silent, afraid to repeat myself. “No really, I didn’t ‘ear ya.” He used the paw that wasn’t currently on my face to point up at the long ears atop his head. “Dese fings are just for show, despite popular opinion.”

He raised his eyebrows, patiently waiting for me to explain my interruptive comment. I really didn’t know what to say.

“Well,” he squeezed my muzzle even harder, to the point where my eyes started watering, “I must be losing my fucking marbles over ‘ere.” With a strong shove, he sent me toppling over to the floor. The unexpected loss of balance caught me off guard; I barely had time to think before I was falling, and wasn’t able to put my arms out in front of me to catch myself. My nose collided head-on with the dirty ground with a sickening crack, setting off an explosion of pain throughout my nerves.

“Fuck! I think you broke my fucking nose!” I cried out.

My attacker ignored my comment as residue of cheese and bee fuzz from the floor made their way into my eyes.

Trying to blink it away, I started to pull myself back up before a heavy foot slammed my head back to its original position. I could only see the carpet from my point of view, but I could feel the hare lean down to my exposed ear.

“I’m _really_ gonna enjoy dis, mate.” He edged his face a little bit farther away from me, but not far enough to not feel his musty breath. His arms rose and restlessly slapped against his sides when he noticed the others in the room were just standing there. “Don’t fucking loiter! Dis vulpine ain’t gonna tie up itself.”

Still cemented to the floor, the hippo bent down and managed to restrain both my arms with one hand. Letting the hare remove his foot, he violently took hold of my head and slid the muzzle on, having to work hard against the friction of my fur. I winced as it dragged across my recently shattered snout. The muzzle was way too small.

But I didn’t struggle. I’d been through this before. Struggling would’ve gotten me nowhere.

I was briefly let go from the iron grip of the hippo, and was able to roll on my back to get a good look at what the mammals were doing to me. I pressed my paw against where I smacked against the floor, and brought it back to find it matted with blood. The elephant had finally joined his buddies in the apartment, and was reaching the iron pole in his hand over to me.

_Wait...I’ve seen that thing before...is that an...animal control pole?_

Back when I was in school, I had a history lesson talking about those things. Prey communities used to enslave tigers and lions once they’d evolved enough to outsmart them, and had fashioned poles to wrap around their neck to restrain them. This kept them in sight and under control at all times, always in range for the crack of a whip.

I’d seen pictures before, I think there’s one in the Natural History Museum, but they haven’t been used for hundreds, if not thousands of years.

_Do they really think I’m that dangerous?_

The wire at the end fit itself around my exposed cervix, and was pulled uncomfortably tight once in the proper position. With that, the elephant hoisted me up, making me cough uncontrollably at the lack of air reaching my throat.

“Dere we go.” The hare said proudly, crossing his arms. “Nice and snug. Now, let’s get down to business, hm?”

With a poke to my back from the hippo, we left the complex. A large, white van with the same ‘Predator Control’ label painted on the side was parked on the trash-ridden streets.

The wire dug into my flesh as we walked, and the muzzle was leaving a painful etching on my head. I rose my paws to try and adjust restraint to a more cozy fit, but they were slapped away by the hare beside me.

“Ya don’t wanna go an’ do dat,” he said mockingly. “Ya look wonderful, I promise.”

I sighed, looking down to the ground. “Can you at least loosen this stuff? It kinda hurts…”

“Aw! Wittle fox’s face huwts!” he replied with a fake pout. “Grow up, you fucking pred.”

With the elephant still towering behind me, animal control pole in hand, I reached the two doors on the back of the truck. The hippo swung the right side open, echoing out a sickening grinding of metal. The end of the pole pressed against the top of my spine, ushering me into the back of the vehicle without another word. The elephant gave the wire just enough slack to slip it off of my head, and just like that, the door slammed shut just as fast as it was opened.

There were no lights here, but my eyes were able to adjust accordingly, compensating for the overwhelming darkness. It was just like a box. Plain steel walls, no benches to rest on, and no windows; not even leading to the driver’s seat of the van.

I trudged over to the back wall and plopped down, crossing my legs. I heard the annoying laughter of the Australian hare faintly through the walls, the sound moving over to the side of me until it reached the front, followed by the opening and closing of the driver and passenger doors.

The van started up and began moving shortly after, catching me off guard and sending me reeling over from the sudden shift in gravity. Luckily, I was able to catch myself this time, and pressed my back harder against the wall as to avoid falling again.

 _If these guys are_ this _damn polite from the get-go, I really don’t wanna know how bad things’ll get once I get the collar on…_

…

Bad was too kind of a description.

The engine was cut at the heart of Zootopia, which would’ve been a reassuring sight if I didn’t have a broken nose, a specist escort, and a crippling sensitivity to the light blasting in my retinas. Traffic passed by and horns blared as I always remembered it had before, except of course with a drastic decline in predators.

After the control pole was tightly returned to my neck, I shaded a paw over my irritated eyes to get a good look at the city around. The vibrant colors and advertisements on the skyscrapers were a very familiar sight, but there was one key difference.

Judy’s face was plastered _everywhere_.

I saw a poster of her every ninety degrees I turned. With her hands at her hips, a respectable posture, and larger-than-life smile, she was depicted on countless sloganed signs.

‘ _We’ll make the world a better place.’_

_‘We are strong! Prey are strong! Take me for example.’_

_‘Anyone can be anything.’_

Every poster, every billboard, hell, even public benches had different captions to fortify the prey population, all carrying the face of Officer Hopps. On the corner of every sign was a Precint 1 ZPD logo.

_Shit, Honey wasn’t kidding about her influence…_

I was pulled away from my thoughts, metaphorically and literally, from the impatient hare.

“Come on den, fox. Ya don’t wanna be scaring dese nice people ‘ere. Git inside quick, or I’ll kick your arse back to da shithole ya came from.”

I was dragged along by my captors into what appeared to be a fairly new edition to the Zootopia real estate. A cube-like, windowless, dull white building that I’d never seen before stood in front of me. ‘Predator Control’ was read on the front.

A gust of cool air rushed over me when I walked through the doors, momentarily distracting me from the extreme discomfort I was suffering. Many prey animals walked about the building, some guiding predators in the same position I was in; muzzled and leashed. There was an area that appeared to be a waiting room of some sort that occupied several preds that had their collars on. When I saw some were continuously flinching in pain, I realized that their collars were broken, repeatedly shocking them, and they were waiting to get them fixed. I imagined that something as serious as a faulty shock collar would be of utmost importance, but apparently the safety of those mammals wasn’t too much of a concern. A doctor shuffled in to take care of another patient, with a predator walking out from the door behind him. They were being treated one at a time. Some of them would probably have to wait hours before getting seen.

I directed my attention to where I was being led when we passed the waiting room, and noticed I was being taken to a far less populated area of the building. We made our way down a narrow hallway, occasionally being passed by some prey that looked to be a doctor. Once we reached a door at the end of the corridor, the hare cracked his knuckles and elbowed me to get me to prod into the room.

It seemed to be just like a normal doctor’s office, but then again, I hadn’t had much previous experience in such a place so I wasn’t so sure.

Still attached to the control pole, I guessed I was supposed to sit on the bench covered in replaceable white paper. The elephant ducked under the door frame to keep up with me, and once I was sedentary, he removed the wire from my neck.

This freedom was short-lived, however, as almost immediately after the hare secured an even tighter restraint around my neck, this one being attached to the wall so I couldn’t escape. I instinctively reached up to try and satisfy an itch that had been bugging me for the better half of the time I’d spent with these mammals, only to get my paw slapped away.

“Doctor should be wif ya in ‘bout an hour. Don’t wanna ya escapin’ or nuffin’ while we got our backs turned. Last time a pred tried to get out of dis, it did _not_ end well for him to put it lightly,” the rabbit boasted, smiling as if reminiscing upon fond memories. “Don’t want da same fate, now do ya, foxy?” He slapped a paw on my shoulder, more with the intention of pain than a friendly gesture. I decided to take his question as rhetorical.

“Am I really gonna have to sit here an hour? I saw like twenty doctors just on the walk over here!”

“Dey’re busy...not like you’d know nuffin’ ‘bout actual work…” He muttered the last part to himself.

The hippo and elephant either thought that their work was done, or they knew the hare wanted some alone time with me, so they both left the room, closing the door behind them.

His ears lifted straight up in attention at the slamming of the door.

“Ya know, I’ve never really been da biggest fan of foxes.”

“Really?” I asked sarcastically. “I couldn’t tell.”

He ignored my assholery. “Ya, decidin’ to put dem collars on da lot of ya was da best idea since sliced fuckin’ bread.” The hare started to chuckle. “Come to fink of it, your kind probably slices my bread...and packs it, too. Hell, I bet they picked the fucking wheat for me!” He started full-on laughing. “You preds are just such _angels_ . Ya do all da shit jobs we don’t want, _and_ ya get paid next to fuckin’ nothing for it as well. If that’s not a deal, I don’t know what is.” His laughter died down, and he looked up at me to see my eyes staring daggers at him.

“What’s wif da glare, foxy? Upset ya got stuck wif the shit genetics?” He approached me and flicked my injured nose, causing me to grunt and cover it up in pain. “I mean, I’m just tryin’ to fink about it myself, puttin’ myself it your shoes and all that crap, but it’s just so...pafetic.” He smirked at me, clearly enjoying every bit of what came from his mouth. “To be a predator, _and_ a fox? Talk about a double negative, and you for one sure as hell ain’t makin’ a positive.”

My scowl at the hare deepened so much it hurt.

_What’s this guy’s deal? We’ve never even met before!_

“Tell me again, why ain’t ya wearin’ a collar?”

I had to clench my eyes and take a deep breath before I spoke to avoid lashing out at this guy.

_Never let them see that they get to you._

“Purifiers shot me in the head and put me in a coma for three years. Nobody bothered to collar me while I was out.”

His face scrunched up in thought. “Purifiers you say? Huh...déjà vu.” He took another look at me and quickly left without giving the courtesy of acknowledging his sudden departure.

_Déjà vu? The fuck is that supposed to mean._

Now that I was alone, I was finally able to assess the damage done to my nose. I ran it over with my paw. Even the slightest touch caused a flare of pain, and I brought my paw back to see a hint of blood. I could smell it when I breathed in, and it was beginning to dry against the fur, giving me an unpleasant sensation of a stuffy nose.

_Whelp, just fifty-eight more minutes of waiting and maybe someone will actually have the decency to show me some care._

I stretched out my legs and lied down on the crumpled wax paper.

…

Decency was apparently too much to ask.

I’d dozed off on the bench, still tired from the long night with Honey, and was awoken by the faint conversing of two mammals just outside of my room.

“ _See for ya fuckin’ self, I’m pretty sure it’s da same fox.”_

_“It can’t be. There’s no way.”_

_“I’m tellin’ ya mate. ‘E matches da description. We just need some surefire way to tell.”_

The door opened and I scrambled onto my ass before anyone could see me attempting to get comfortable. In came a pig, who was much leaner and more muscular than stereotypes would expect, followed closely behind by the same hare as before.

“Hello Mr. Wilde, I’m Dr. Hogally. Let’s get this collar on you so we could get out of your fur. I assume you don’t want to be sitting here much longer with a busted nose, hm?” He spoke in a bored, monotone voice, as if I wasn’t worth his precious time. There was something oddly familiar, yet intimidating, about the way he spoke.

“What, you’re not gonna fix it for me? Your fucking goon over here was the one that broke it!” I accused, gesturing a paw in the bastard hare’s direction.

The pig rolled his eyes and sighed. “I’m sure you’re blowing things much out of proportion. Randy here is a professional, and always reads the protocol for uncollared mammals before proceeding in his actions. He would only harm you if provoked.”

“Provoked?! He shoved me face first into the ground because I didn’t want to wear a muzzle! I didn’t do _anything_ to threaten this asshole.”

The hare scowled at the name I called him.

“Listen ‘ere fox-” he started as he approached me. The pig held out an arm, blocking him from getting any closer.

“Now now, Randy, let’s not get carried away. We’re not the savages here, remember?”

 _Jesus Christ, is_ everybody _in Zootopia really this damn ignorant?_

“Now, Mr. Wilde-”

“It’s Nick.”

“...Nick...I assume you don’t know much about the laws of the Official Predator Circumscription Act due to the...unfortunate...recent occurrences, so I’ll be so kind as to fill you in.”

I snorted, feeling a few droplets of blood spew from my nostrils. “How very kind indeed, Dr. Hogally.”

“As you may have noticed every predator in Zootopia is now equipped with a specially made correctional collar. Whenever primitive instincts threaten to reappear, the collar delivers a mild shock to remind you that we now live in a civilized, _savage-free,_ society. My colleagues and I here at ‘Predator Control’ want nothing more than to live in a city without the presence of savages. This is why what we do _must_ be done. Is this all clear to you Mr.- uh, Nick?”

“Crystal.”

“Perfect. Now, with that out of the way, how about we get down to business. Randy, if you’d be so kind?”

The hare gave me another look of hate and turned to the counter behind him to look through the drawers. After a few seconds of searching, he came back out with a collar very similar to the one Honey was wearing, albeit much dirtier.

“Chin up, foxy. Don’t want no accidents happenin’, eh?”

I looked down at the collar, thinking about the future I was setting myself up to have with it.

 _This can’t be_ too _bad, can it? I mean, I’ve lived most of my life showing as little emotion as possible, this should be a cakewalk._

“I said chin up, dipshit!”

_Or maybe not, with mammals like these roaming the planet._

I rose my head, with the collar attaching me to the wall still around my neck. I wondered how they’d be able to wrap both around me at once.

Answering my question, the pig moved forward and grabbed the restraint, raising it up as high as possible, folding my skin painfully over and limiting my air supply. The hare then proceeded to forcefully tie the collar around me, snapping it into place once his paws were at the back of my neck. Once it was nice and secure, the pig removed the first collar, giving me much more room to breath. Things still weren’t too great though. The collar was tight as hell…

“Dere we go! Not too bad, hm?” the hare asked with an obviously forced smile.

I returned the gesture. “Thank you. It’s everything I’ve ever hoped and dreamed for. Now, am I free to go?”

“I’m afraid not, Nick,” the pig piped in. “Did you really think we’d let a newly collared pred back out on the streets without even testing if it was functioning properly?”

I groaned. “You gotta be kidding me…”

“Don’t worry, it’s a standard procedure. Shouldn’t hurt more than a pinprick.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small black device with a button on it.

_BZZRT_

A sea of pain exploded in my neck and travel down every nerve in my body, causing my hands to shoot up to clutch my neck in attempt to ease the intensity. Although it only lasted a couple seconds, it felt like the hurt lasted a full minute. My veins throbbed, bringing in a whole new wave of pain every instant despite the shock being over.

“A pinprick!? What are you fucking stup-”

_BZZRT_

An even more severe dose of electrocution cut off my outburst, shutting me up and making me fly back against the wall behind me. I clenched my eyes shut and felt fresh tears roll down my face in response to the pain, mixing in the blood from my nose injury.

“Ah, perfect! Wonderful job, Nick! You did the second test for us!” the pig exclaimed with joy. “You’re free to go.”

I managed open my eyes and stare at them in disbelief.

_That was fucking torture! How could this help anybody?_

Not wasting a single second, I hopped out of my seat and left the room, trying my best to distance myself from the mammals as quickly as possible.

As I was exiting, I made out the two talking again.

_“So whaddaya think, Ryan?”_

_“It’s him. You got where he lives; we’ll deal with him when the time comes…”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, hares can grow to be about as big as foxes. I made this one especially big, however, just to make him a bit more intimidating.


	7. Her

_ I totally forgot to get Honey’s phone number… _

I was stuck in the heart of Zootopia and I didn’t know how to get back to Happytown, with it being a recent edition to the city and all. I knew the area like the back of my paw, so getting directions certainly wouldn’t have been a problem; however I wasn’t so sure if anyone would be willing to help me out.

I was a big fish in a small pond...or a ‘savage predator’ in a ‘helpless prey community’.

I stood outside of the ‘Predator Control’ building, weighing my options. If everything else Honey had warned me about the attitude towards predators was true, I needed to be very careful.

_ Bus? No, if everyone hates foxes as much as that hare did, I won’t last five minutes. I could try and find my way back there myself...but the ride over here was at least a forty-five minutes. Even if I manage to head in the right direction, it’d probably take hours if I walk. _

I shoved my paws in my pockets and leaned my back against the wall of the building, crossing my legs and letting out a grunt of frustration.

_ I could always just ask someone… _

I looked around at the mammals walking along the streets. Most, if not all, were giving me judgemental side glances as they passed by. 

“ _ Pred shit. _ ”

“ _ The fuck is that vermin doing standing around? _ ”

Many more comments were thrown once I was out of sight but not out of earshot.

_...or not. _

The sky represented a fading orange as the sun started setting; it was going to be dark soon. I checked my watch to see it was nearly seven. It’d be at least another hour until Honey’s shift ended assuming it was a slow day at the hospital, and even then, it’d probably take another hour for her to realize something’s wrong and try to track me down. I eyed the departure of the yellow orb in the sky as I sighed in desperation. Utter hopelessness coursed through me.

“Hey, fox.”

I gave my head a brief shake and broke my gaze from up above to look to my side and acknowledge who spoke to me. I saw two hooves laced onto the torso of a rather large body. I redirected my gaze back upwards, except this time following the neck attached to the tall figure.

“What are you doing?”

An accusing looking giraffe towered over me, covering me in a faint shadow that would soon disappear along with the sun.

“I-, um…”

_ No jokes. These guys definitely can’t take one. _

“I was just about to go…”

The giraffe scoffed down at me, clearly not wanting to believe a word that exited my mouth.

“Is that so? Riddle me this, fox, how come a beaten up figure such as yourself is suspiciously standing outside a pred control center?”

My hand shot up to my bloodied nose, the pain of which had for the most part subsided.

“Planning on doing anything?” he continued.

“N-no, sir, I was just getting a collar is all.” I flashed him a quick smile to try and appear more convincing.

His eyebrows narrowed, and he lowered his extensive neck to get closer to my face.

“You’re saying you weren’t wearing a collar?”

My face fell. “...I-, well…”

“What’s really going on here?”

I looked around the surrounding area to see a few bystanders had gathered to view the confrontation.

“N-nothing! I swear! I was just-”

“You were gonna attack someone in there, weren’t you?” he impugned.

“What? No! They-”

“Or did you try something shifty in there already? That’s why your face is fucked up, isn’t it?”

I shut my mouth. Negotiating with this guy wasn’t going to get me anywhere, so I stood and prayed he’d eventually get tired and walk away. The few prey that had bunched up around him held the same skeptical gaze as the giraffe.

“Hm?”

I remained quiet.

“Trust me, fox, I’m the last person you’ll wanna pull this shit with, so you better spit out whatever the hell you were doing or I’ll have to use other methods to convince you.”

I backed up farther into the wall behind me, the light on my collar blinking to a threatening yellow.

“I just needed directions to get home…” I breathed out.

A strong hoof collided with my abdomen, forcing me to double over from the sudden pain. I violently started coughing from the pressure exerted on my lungs and fell to my knees, paws pressed against the rough concrete under me, breathing excessively. I attempted to crawl away from the giraffe, but an antelope and a beaver held me down in place. These people were strangers, but they were still joining together to torture me. It was as if this was a normal occurrence.  

“You’d better answer him, man,” the beaver muttered into my ear. “I wanna stop touching you just as much as you wanna get out of here.”

I let out one final cough and arched my head back to my attacker.

“I’m telling the truth! They brought me in to fit this collar on me but I don’t know how to get back to Happytown.”

“Now why the fuck weren’t you wearing a collar?” he argued. “Every pred needs to wear a collar.”

“...um-”

I was cut off my a blow to the face, just below my right eye, hitting me off balance and making me topple over to the ground. The other side of my face scraped against the rugged surface. My paws flew up to comfort where I was struck, already feeling a tingling puffiness from the incoming swelling.

_ BZZRT _

My paws went straight from my face down to my collar as I convulsed on the spot from the electricity. Despite all of the pain I was going through, the antelope and beaver refused to let me move from the spot.

“I could do this all day, pal,” the giraffe piped up. “The wife isn’t expecting me home ‘till ten.”

I let a few more shaky exhales loose and squeezed my eyes shut, afraid of the giraffe getting angry again.

“I don’t know what you want me to  _ say _ !” I muttered through my teeth. I felt another hoof grip either one of my cheeks, and I opened my eyes to see the antelope staring right at me. 

“Where are your manners? Look at someone when they’re speaking to you,” the female voice of the mammal let out. From behind her, I could see a very similar, yet much smaller in size antelope looking at the scene with wide eyes and mouth gaping open. She couldn’t have been any more than seven years old.

_ Jesus Christ, she’s attacking me in front of her fucking kid… _

The adult antelope forced my head back up so I could see the giraffe looming over me.

“What. Were. You. DOING!?”

“Nothing!”

My face, this time the left side, exploded in agony. The entirety of my visage grew numb as the flesh expanded from the irritation.

“Don’t bullshit me, fox!”

“I-”

He sent a firm kick into my stomach. I rolled over from the pain, squeezing my knees up to my chest and raising my arms to shield my face to try and avoid any further damage. Despite my attempts for protection, the giraffe took this as a window of opportunity to continue assaulting. Kick after kick struck my crippled figure, each one sending a new wave of hurt throughout.

_ BZZRT _

My makeshift defense was broken as my limbs flailed in convulsions from the shock of my collar. The giraffe continued kicking my now exposed body.

“Please! I-”

“HEY!”

Another female voice, not the same as the antelope, rang through my ears. The attack suddenly stopped, leaving my new cuts and bruises to throb in pain.

“Oh! Officer! I was just-”

“Assaulting a mammal in broad daylight?”

“Well, to be fair, the sun’s nearly set.”

“You’re far from a position to be joking with me right now, sir.”

I looked up at the giraffe, now standing upright, but still gazing down at whomever was addressing him. A nervous expression was plastered upon his face.

“This fox was snooping around out here. He-”

“You saw a suspicious mammal, and despite this being unnerving to you, you directly attacked him instead of contacting the authorities.”

“...yes, but-”

“You realize, that predator or not, what you’re doing is a punishable offense, right?”

The giraffe remained silent, his nervousness now fully-fledged fear.

“He said he wasn’t wearing a coll-”

“I really couldn't care less about what you suspected of him, you are  _ not  _ an officer of the law, and have absolutely  _ no  _ right to act as such. Do I make myself clear, sir?”

“...yes, Officer.”

“Good.  I have more than enough reasons to arrest you on the spot, but I think I’ll let it slide for now. Get out of my sight before I change my mind.”

He gave me another hateful look before trotting off, the other mammals around me following suit as well. The antelope took her daughter’s hand and headed off into the other direction.

“Mommy?” I heard her ask. “Why were you hurting that mammal?”

“He wasn’t just any mammal, sweetie, he was a pred; and a fox at that.”

“What’s so bad about predators?”

“You’ll learn soon enough, honey.”

The voices faded out until I was left with the feeling that whoever came to my rescue was still there.

“Are you gonna be okay, sir? Can you walk?”

I got up on my elbows and turned my head to see…

_ Oh shit… _

...Judy Hopps.

She was kneeling down beside me, expressing genuine concern and care for my well-being. Her eyes widened and her ears dropped to the back of her head when she saw the damage done to my face.

“Oh sweet cheese and crackers! We need to get you to a hospital!”

_ Does she really not recognize me? Is my face really that swollen? _

I continued to stare up at her in surprise.  
“Can you speak? Can you hear me right now?”

_ Or she might think I’m dead...me getting shot in the face probably wasn’t exactly private information to the ZPD… _

I slowly nodded my head, unable to take my eyes away from the bunny.

“Okay, okay. That’s good. Now...um, you can’t go to any nearby hospital. I’ll have to take you all the way back to Happytown to get treated…”

She stood up, dusting off her knees, before offering me a paw, of which I cautiously took. Once I was on my feet and using her as a temporary crutch, she slowly led me over to her squad car. I looked down at the rabbit I thought I’d given up on. She was helping me…

But then my eyes caught a horribly familiar canister.

_ She’s still carrying fox repellent... _

“Do you think you can hold off for a little while longer? If I drive fast I can probably get you there in a little under a half hour.”

“Mhmm,” I muttered, unable to form words due to what I just noticed.

Once we reached the vehicle, she opened up the back door, the one criminals get into. I gave her a troubled look.

Judy looked at the door and back at me, confused as to why I was so unnerved, until realization washed over her face.

“Oh! Sorry, mammals easily get the wrong idea if they see a predator riding shotgun. I’m not taking you in, don’t worry.”

Unsure of myself, I stared at her for a few more seconds, but eventually climbed in. The car was clearly for much larger mammals, as I basically had to pull myself up with my fatigued arms to make it onto the seat. Once the door was closed, Judy hopped up to the driver’s side of the car. She grabbed onto the handle and pressed her feet against the side of the door to keep herself in place. In one quick movement, she pulled, using the momentum to get the the entrance completely open. Still hanging onto the side of the car, she flung herself up to the roof, dropped down to the edge with her paws, and swung inside.

_ What a clever bunny…specist and fake, but clever nonetheless. _

The engine started and we were off back to Happytown. The first half of the ride was spent completely in silence, leaving me to get a nice look at the city around me. The initial trip into the city was spent in the back of a windowless truck, so the only chance I had to inspect my surroundings were the brief moments outside of the ‘Predator Control’ clinic.

Just as I’d seen before, there was propaganda with Judy’s face slapped on it everywhere. The rabbit driving seemed unphased by her glorified appearance in Zootopia, however. As we drove by, kids playing outside stopped and stared in amazement at the police cruising passing them. Some dropped their jaws in awe, and some pointed in excitement, All of them appeared to be looking up to Judy as a hero of some sorts.

Again, the bunny paid no homage to the barrage of attention, instead focusing solely on the road ahead of her.

I started to think back upon the fact that after all that has happened in the past three years, she still carried around fox repellent with her.

_ I guess she could’ve forgotten about it in the two days we were solving the Night Howlers case, but three years?  _ Three fucking years?!  _ That’s inexcusable. She’s just trying to get the preds on her good side; making them trust her just so she can beat them even further to the ground. _

“What’s your name?”

I looked into Judy’s purple eyes from the rearview mirror, taking a break from my gawking out the window.

I wasn’t so sure if I wanted her to know who I truly was. I couldn’t think of any possible repercussions in doing so, but deep down I just had a feeling that it’d be a bad choice. Honey was right about all of the other problems in the city, so I sure as hell wasn’t going to draw the line at some accusations about the rabbit that betrayed me.

“Uh-, M-mike...Michael.”

Her ears shot upwards at the sound of my voice, at which she turned around to get another look at me. I avoided any eye contact, trying to appear as nonchalant as possible. Slowly, she turned back to the road.

“I’m Officer Judy Hopps, ZPD. Care to tell me what happened back there, Michael?”

My ears flattened against the back of my head.

_ How am I supposed to say this? Naturally she’ll take the prey’s side on this, right? What if she ends up taking me to jail? _

I gulped. “I had, um, I just came out of the clinic, but-, but I wasn’t sure how to get back to Happytown...the pred control guys drove me there, but didn’t give me a ride back.”

I looked back into Judy’s eyes through the mirror. She remained transfixed on her driving.

“So I was thinking about what to do, how to get back, when this guy came up to me and thought I was doing something shady...or-, I-I don’t know. He just attacked me...and those other people just stood by...some helped.”

I thought that I made out Judy whisper ‘jerks’ under her breath.

“He kept asking me what I was doing, but I didn’t know what to tell him. So he just kept hitting me...and my collar started to shock me…and…” My voice started to crack, taking me by surprise, turning my collar yellow and cutting me off.

“It’s okay. You can stop.”

Nobody spoke for a few more minutes.

“Just to be sure, you  _ weren’t  _ doing anything illegal there...were you?” she asked.

I turned towards her, disgusted at what she just implied.

_ Nice to see she hasn’t changed. _

When she figured I wasn’t going to answer her, she continued. “I guess I’ll just give you the benefit of the doubt, then. What those mammals did to you wasn’t fair, predator or no. I’d suggest pressing charges, but I doubt that would really accomplish anything.”

The nicer parts of the city started to blend into murky apartments and trashy streets. I took note of the lack of signs signifying the crossing into Happytown. It wasn’t even a designated area, it was just a forced living suburb for predators.

“Why can’t  _ you  _ do anything to help?”

A single one of her ears twitched at the question. “What do you mean?” she replied.

“I mean your face is on every inch of the city. You clearly have power, why don’t you use it?”

“...it just doesn’t work that way.”

“And why the hell not?!” Judy flinched at the sudden raising of my voice. “You saw it yourself! Those mammals were beating me fucking senseless with absolutely no instigation on my part, yet there’s not justice.”

I looked back out the window. “It’s because I’m a predator, isn’t it?”

The rabbit squirmed uncomfortably in her seat, but remained silent.

“Hmph,” I chortled. “And to think you call yourself a police officer…”

“...I’m sorry...I can’t do anything about it. I-, I’m sorry…”

“Sure you are. Drop me off at the Happytown District Hospital. I got a friend that works there.”

The sun had completely set, leaving the broken image of Happytown to be only slightly illuminated by the few working streetlights. Some predators could be seen smoking out of their apartment windows, but none were directly outside. The only living mammals that passed by were in the ZPD.

The police cruiser turned into the swing-around drive-in for the hospital.

“Thanks for the lift, Officer,” I said as I unbuckled my seatbelt and carefully dropped down to the floor, attempting to avoid further injury. I thrusted open the door and hopped down again, turning to close it once I got to the ground.

“Michael, I know it doesn’t mean much, but I really am sorry...for everything. It’s not fair, and I understand that, but things are really complicated in Zootopia at the moment.” I couldn’t see Judy’s face from my low position on the ground, but I could hear her apologetic voice quite clearly.

I sighed, and held onto the side of the door with my paw.

“You know, I’ve been beaten up plenty of times in my life. Many being even worse than this. But it’s always been for something I’d done; it was karma. This is the  _ second _ time I have been attacked just for being born the way I was. I highly doubt you can empathize with me on this one.”

“I-”

“Save it,” I interrupted, closing my eyes and holding up my other paw. “If you still feel the need to carry around ‘Fox Repellent’, I don’t think we have much more to discuss, Carrots.”

I slammed the door and hobbled into the hospital, not pausing for Judy’s response.


	8. Terror in Happytown

Surprisingly, I’d say the main source of my discomfort was the lack of air conditioning in the hospital.

Beads of sweat rolled down my face, mixing with the blood that soaked my fur. The sun may have been gone, but it was still scorching hot inside the building, and the crowd of mammals in the waiting room didn’t do much to help with the temperature.

In fact, it looked like most of the mammals in the room with me had just been newly injured. Some looked to be in critical condition. Those that were stable enough to wait for a while clutched at their wounds in pain, struggling to prevent the liquid crimson from escaping their bodies. The smell of scorched fur reached my nose, momentarily making me gag. Hospital staff scurried about, carrying predators on gurneys and controlling their blood loss as they sat in their seats. They were desperately low on doctors.

While taking in the gruesome scene around me, I approached the front desk to see a female serval acting as frantic as everyone else.

Without looking up from the papers she was rummaging through, she sensed my presence and greeted me.

“I apologize in advance, but I’m going to have to ask you to remain patient if your injuries do not require immediate care. Leave your name on the sheet on the desk and take a seat.”

“Uh, ok. How long, exactly, do you think that’ll take?” I asked cautiously as I reached up to scribble my name down.

She briefly looked up to acknowledge me, flinching at the sight of my beaten face.

“Hopefully no more than two hours,” she answered apologetically, “but it’s really hard to tell right now. We don’t have nearly enough staff to take care of recent events. Again, if you don’t require immediate care, I’m going to have to ask you to remain patient and take a seat.” She motioned towards the few spots that weren’t currently occupied and returned her attention back to her work.

My eyes were nearly shut due to the swelling of my flesh, but I managed to identify an empty seat to take. Once I’d sat down, I took a closer look at the other injured mammals.

Upon further inspection, it seemed almost everyone was here for the same reason. Many were trying to avoid their burned skin from brushing against any objects, and others were clutching newly opened cuts.

I looked to the left of me to see a particularly shaken up mink that couldn’t have been any older than fourteen. The fur near his elbow was singed black, and a long gash ran down his cheek. Fresh tears lowered the blood’s viscosity, making it drip down to his pants at a much faster rate. Some of the dampness covered his collar, almost making the yellow light look red.

Despite his condition, he appeared to be in a much better physical state than any of the other predators here, so I decided to ask him about the crowd of hurt mammals.

“Hey, kid.”

The mink sloppily wiped away anything staining his face and slowly looked up to meet my eyes. Unlike any nearly everybody else, he wasn’t too disgusted by my appearance.

He didn’t immediately reply, so I continued. “Got any idea why everybody here looks like they’ve been through a furnace?”

I must’ve hit a bad note when a side that, because a few more tears streamed from the boy’s eyes. He moved his gaze back down to the tiny paws folded in his lap. I followed suit, twiddling my thumbs in embarrassment of my insensitive comment.

_ Way to go Nick. You’re really shitty with children, you know that? _

“There was an explosion or something…”

I shot my head back to the mink.

“I was playing at a baseball game,” his shaky voice resumed, “and when I was at bat...there was just a  _ bang _ .”

I stayed silent, unable to form the right words. Was I supposed to comfort the kid? I’d never been in many situations like this before, aside from faking public tantrums with Finnick dressed up as a elephant.

“I-, uh...sorry for asking,” I said awkwardly.

Neither of us talked for a while. I watched as one by one, patients were taken in to be treated. Honey was probably pretty occupied in there; I hadn’t seen her come to take a patient once.

“You?” the child stated bluntly.

I looked back at him. “What about me?”

He gave a pained smile. “Your face looks like a red balloon, you weren’t caught in an explosion. What happened to you?”

“Oh, this.” I rose a paw up to gently rub my face. “Some asshole wasn’t too happy that I was ‘snooping around’, as he put it, so he decided to put me in my place.”

The mink chuckled my saying of the word ‘asshole’.

“That’s not very nice.”

“No, not very nice indeed,” I agreed, returning the small grin he was giving me.

“I’m Clyde,” he greeted, holding out a paw.

“Nick,” I said, accepting the shake.

“These doctors are like sloths.” He looked around as another patient tentatively followed a doctor out of the waiting room.

“Heh, tell me about it. How long have you been waiting?”

“Only an hour, but it feels like it’s been a year. They don’t even have a TV in here!”

“Ah, I see you’ve fallen victim to the ancient torturing technique of boredom.”

“You should be talking! You just got here!”

“Touché, kid. Touché.”

Clyde brought his legs up on the chair with him, hugging them close to im with his arms. The tears had stopped, but he still bore a saddened expression.

“You gonna be okay?” I asked worriedly, trying avoid making another bad move.

“...I know my dad’s here, but I haven’t seen my mom since the baseball game.”

“Oh…” I looked down at the ground, but hopefully rose my head back up. “What about your dad?”

“Don’t have one…”

I once again lowered my head back to the floor, all confidence to make the mink feel better erased.

“I mean, she could be with a doctor right now. Or better yet, she might not’ve been hurt. She’s probably looking for you right now.”

Clyde’s eyes briefly glimmered with faith.

“You think so?”

I hesitated, not wanting to grant the kid a false promise. “...yeah. Yeah, I do.”

He rested his chin atop his knees, a smile twitching his lips to the side. He gave a short chuckle. “We were probably gonna win the game, too…”

I found myself chuckling as well, and when the mink joined in for another round, the chuckling turned into full-fledged laughter.

“It was probably the other team that blew the place up; we were crushing them so bad!” he made out, wiping a tear away as he giggled.

“I take it you’re the star player of the little league if they set it off while you as bat, huh?”

“I guess you could say that,” he sighed hesitantly.

“That didn’t sound too confident, bud. You look like an athlete if I’ve ever seen one. In fact, I bet you hit the ball so hard the parents of those other kids spontaneously combusted.”

For a second I thought I’d went a bit too far with my quipping, but the kid, to my surprise, continued to laugh.

“I promise, I not  _ that  _ good.”

“Alright, maybe not, but give yourself a little more credit. Self-esteem goes a long way, ya know.”

He rose a paw to the still-bleeding cut on his cheek. “Maybe, but this isn’t gonna help too much…”

“What are you talking about! Chicks  _ dig  _ scars, man. Now it’ll be the first thing they see once they meet you, and if that doesn’t convince ‘em, you got a sick backstory to back it up.”

He gave me a puzzled look.

“A piece of scrap metal hit me in the face right before I was about to strike out? That doesn’t sound too cool to me…”

“Well you gotta bend the truth a little. If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s bending the truth.”

Clyde cocked his head to the side. “So what should I say instead?”

I stroked my chin a second in thought. “Oh! How ‘bout this?” I cleared my throat. “Clyde the stud, professional athlete, is up to bat. The opposing team starts to shake in fear; they know they got an ass whoopin’ coming their way. So,” I crossed one leg over the other, getting more comfortable as I told my story, “just as the ball is hurdling towards you, a loud noise catches you off guard. Your super sharp reflexes take over, and you just barely avoid a ferociously sharp piece of metal from slicing your neck, narrowly escaping the cold grasp of death. But wait!” I shot a finger up in the air. “Clyde the stud is certainly not one to let his team down. As if the world is moving in slow motion, you turn to hit the ball as it’s still midair. It goes out of the park, and if it weren’t for the severity of the situation, the crowd would’ve been up on their feet, chanting your name like you’re a baseball god.”

Clyde sat there in amazement, his cheeks burning red from the constant praise I was sending his way. “Well...if you put it  _ that  _ way…”

“There we go!” I exclaimed, slapping a paw on his shoulder. “Nothing wrong with a little white lie every now and then.”

“ _ Clyde Parker!”  _ a voice boomed from the end of the waiting room.

The mink twitched his head towards the source of the noise. “That’s me.” He turned back to look at me in the eyes. “Thanks for...talking to me and stuff. It made me feel a little better.” He got up out of his chair.

“No problem, dude. I’ll see you around. Hopefully my face isn’t so messed up next time we meet.”

“Yeah,” he snickered. “You aren’t too nice to look at right now.”

“I appreciate the feedback.”

“See ya.” He waved and went off to the awaiting nurse.

_ Guess I’m not too bad with children after all. _

…

Clyde wasn’t joking about how boring it could. Nearly two hours had passed by since the mink had left, and I was so tired of trying to find patterns in the wallpaper that I started to hallucinate.

Every time I tried to doze off, my face would roll onto my shoulder and shoot a wave of pain throughout me.

After what felt like an eternity of toying around with mindless paw fidgeting, a nurse called my name.

I followed her through a few short hallways and into a small room. It was very different from the one I’d stayed in after I’d awoken from my coma, yet very similar to the one at the pred control clinic, albeit much dirtier and cheaper.

I sat down in the patient’s bench as the nurse left, feeling uncomfortable due to the lack of wax paper meant to separate me from whomever was sitting here last.

An unreasonably long twenty minutes passed by before the door finally opened. It was Honey.

She looked like complete and utter shit. Dark bags hung under her bloodshot eyes, the long night she had just had probably not doing much to help. She shuffled in, gently shutting the door behind her, and went to go and wash her paws.

“Long day, Honey?”

She quickly did a one-eighty at the sound of my voice, fresh water dripping from her just-washed paws.

“Nick?!”

“The one and only,” I confirmed raising my arms up to present myself.

“Holy  _ fuck,  _ what the hell happened?! I can barely recognize you!”

“I ran into a bit of an altercation while getting this collar here.”

“Altercation my ass!” she argued, approaching me to get a closer look. “It’s like somebody smashed your snout with a hammer and then pumped your face full of air.”

“Glad to hear I haven’t lost any of my charming looks.”

“Seriously, Nick, what happened?”

I let out a tired sigh, dropping the facade that everything was fine and dandy, and gave her the rundown on everything that occurred from the time she left the apartment to now. As I recounted the details, she checked me over for any possible signs of serious injury.

Once I got to the part about Judy, she dropped everything she was doing and stared at me, listening in shock.

“...and that’s about the long and short of it.”

She stood in place, her jaw dropped to the floor. She gave her head a brief shake to come back to her senses and started to question me.

“Wait, wait,  _ wait _ . Hold up! You’re saying Judy Hopps, the rabbit officer, face of the ZPD... _ helped  _ you? Did she know who you were? Did she hurt you at all? Is she still here? What-”

“Hold the phone, Honey! I’m just one mammal! No matter how much shit this mouth spews, it can only answer one question at a time, believe it or not.”

“Just answer, wiseass.”

I rolled my eyes. “Yes she helped me. Just like I told you, that giraffe had we on the ground, and she came by and stopped them. She didn’t take me to jail or anything, she just took me straight here. I have a feeling it was against her better judgement, however. As for her knowing who I am, she might. I said a few things she may have picked up on...an inside joke we had for the time we sent solving the Night Howler case.” I looked up, reminiscing on the time I’d spent as friends with the rabbit.

“She didn’t hurt me, all this was from the giraffe or hare, and if she bothered sticking around, I doubt she’s still here. I’ve been waiting for hours.”

The badger rubbed her paws over her eyes in disbelief. “I just...what the _hell_?”  
“Hey, I’m saying she’s an angel or anything. She was just doing her job.”

“Nick being unfair to preds practically  _ is  _ the ZPD’s job. I’d expect her more than anyone to send you straight to the slammer just for having sharp teeth...unless…” Honey furrowed her eyebrows, her face scrunching up in deep thought.

“...unless?” I asked.

“She’s trying to trick you.”

“Trick me?”

“Of course! She’s getting as many predators as possible on her good side so she can strike when we least expect it. She’s definitely picked up quite a few planning tactics from the sheep she’s working with.”

“Oh, for the love of God,” I complained. “Quit it with the sheep already!”

“A  _ lamb _ is the mayor of Zootopia! I’m just pointing out the obvious!”

“Can you just fix me up so we can go home already?”

She groaned. “Fiiiine.” She muttered something along the lines of ‘Don’t tell me how to do my job’ and went off to work.

* * *

 

I was prescribed my fair share of pain medication. Honey had done some X-rays and found that I’d fractured a rib when the giraffe was kicking me on the ground, so I’d have for that along with my facial bruises to heal on their own. 

As for my nose, she had to set it back in place.

Luckily, there was medication to numb the pain, but not any medication that was nearly strong enough. Predators don’t get that luxury. After she injected me with something, she held my nostrils open with some instruments, and with some tugging (and swearing on my part) the bones and cartilage were back where should be.

There were still a few people in the waiting room once I was done, so I waited another hour or two while Honey took care of everyone else. Once the late-shift doctors came in, we began our walk to her apartment.

The streets were so dark at this time of night that I wondered how I’d be able to get by if it weren’t for superior vision. Honey led the way, as I still wasn’t too familiar with the neighborhood.

The constant breeze through my fur did little to eradicate the blaring heat. I was desperate to get indoors, despite Honey’s place lacking proper air conditioning.

We walked side by side, making idle conversation, until I decided to bring up the whole ‘bomb’ situation that was brought to my attention earlier.

“So...you got any details on what happened at that baseball game? With the explosions and all?”

Honey shoved her hands in her pockets and sighed, seemingly uncomfortable with the topic.

“Nothing’s confirmed yet, but we’re estimating around 15 fatalities and dozens more injured. The hospitals gonna be slammed for the next few weeks.”

“No, I meant uh...why did it happen?”

Honey gave me a quick nervous glance as she slowed her pace down and dropped her voice to a near whisper.

“My best guess? Purifiers.”

My eyes widened in shock. “They’d do something like that? This was planned? Not some accident or anything?”

“There’s no way it could’ve been an accident. How could there be a gas leak in the bleachers of a little league baseball game? No, there were definitely bombs planted there, and The Purifiers are the only people that come to mind when I think of people who would have any kind of motive.”

I looked down at my feet as I walked. “...shit.”

We traveled along the sidewalk the whole way back in silence.

…

We were both cozied up on the bean bag chair, extremely fatigued after such an arduous day. Honey was forced into an awkward position, trying to avoid putting too much pressure on my ribs as she sat next to me. We mindlessly watched TV for quite a while, but never let out so much as a chuckle whenever we saw something that would’ve normally had us in stitches.

“Hey Honey?”

“Hm?”

“There was some kid there in the waiting room with me. Clyde...Parker was it? Do you know if he’s staying the night there?”

The badger gave a lazy shrug. “I don’t know. Somebody else must’ve been taking care of him. Why do you ask?”

“Well, I mean...” I scratched the back of my head. “He’s young, and he said he didn’t know where his mom is. They’d...they’d let him know if she  _ died  _ or something, right?”

She stared at the TV for a moment.

“It was really hectic in there,” she finally replied monotonously. “But he’s in good paws. If it means anything, I’ll see if I can check up on him tomorrow. Alright?”

“...yeah. Yeah, sounds good.”

Our attention turned back to the screen. Honey eventually got tired of the comedy we were watching; it wasn’t doing much to lift our spirits; so she started surfing through the channels.

After a while, something caught both of our eye’s.

“ _...took place at about 3:47 p.m at a little league game in Happytown. Eyewitness reports suggest that this could be a pred-related dispute. Mayor Dawn Bellwether has this to say…” _

Honey hastily held the remote up and increased the volume.

On the TV was a special bulletin from ZNN, a banner reading “Terror in Happytown” marked the lower half of the screen. In front of a podium and next to two ram bodyguards stood Bellwether, showing her natural shy demeanor clearly on her wooly visage.

She nervously cleared her throat and addressed the crowd, suddenly turning her voice into a much more confident and boisterous tone.

“ _ I’m well aware that many people are concerned for their safety at the moment, but I’m here to assure you that these violent events that have occurred within the past several hours are not a direct threat to Zootopia at large. This was surely an accident that took place between predators, and only predators, and shouldn’t carried towards the prey population in any shape or form. We, of course, care deeply for the safety of all mammals in Zootopia, and will be investigating further into the incident. Questions?” _

Countless paws shot up into the air, momentarily obstructing the view of the lamb. The camera shifted positions to focus on the mayor once again.

She pointed a hoof down at someone. “ _ Yes, you.” _

_ “Many reports are suggesting that this could have been a coordinated attack on the residents of Happytown from the hate group, The Purifiers. Any comment on that, Dawn?” _

_ “We have absolutely no reason to believe that The Purifiers are in any relation with the explosion, or have any history targeting predators as a whole. Next?” _

_ “What was the aftermath of the attack? Is anyone hurt?” _

_ “I’ve received word that there were some injuries do to the bomb, but nothing too extreme has been certified. We will do our very best to ensure that everybody affected by the incident will be properly taken care of. Next question.” _

_ “Does anybody have-” _

Honey shut the TV off, biting her lip in frustration due to what she just heard. I turned my head to look at the badger.

“She doesn’t even care…” she spewed, her voice shaking from pure anger. “She said this was caused by predators? That The Purifiers have no background causing violence against predators? There weren’t any extreme injuries?” She clenched her eyes shut and squeezed her knuckles until they turned white. “If there was any doubt before, this was surely those hateful bastards; and  _ she’s  _ covering up for them if I knew any better.”

I didn’t know what to say to comfort her. I was in shock as well from the ignorant comments the lamb made behind that podium, and had no logical way to explain it.

“I’m going to bed. I got too much shit to worry about tomorrow for  _ this  _ to keep me up.”

The badger defeatedly trudged off and exited the bunker, leaving me alone with the quiet of my thoughts.


	9. Ella Foxtrot

The grimy windows of Honey’s apartment distorted the sunlight that flowed in. The bags under my eyes sunk in like sinkholes, reminding me constantly of the trouble I’ve had sleeping lately. The entire new world I’d been introduced to in the past few days completely sapped all energy out of me in the first place, but the scuffle I had with that giraffe yesterday was the final nail in the coffin. What I saw in the hospital though…

...I don’t even know how to respond to that. I’d never been a witness of an act of such hate, such violence. This happened in the city I’d lived in my whole life. Now everything was so  _ different _ .

Holding back sneezes as I climbed out from under the kitchen sink, I opened up the cabinet to see Honey struggling on the ground to do push-ups, facing away from me. Her arms shook as she went down for another rep, but when she tried to lift herself back up, she collapsed to the floor, panting in exhaustion.

“Trying to get that beach body, Honey?” I called out as I dusted myself off and stood up.

The badger let out a small yelp and quickly rolled into a sitting position. I couldn’t tell if the redness from her face was from fatigue or embarrassment. I crossed my arms and shined a shit-eating grin, extremely proud of myself to find my new friend in such an odd situation. She rolled her eyes and got to her feet when she saw my chest heaving in and out from silent chuckles.

“Training for the sheep uprising, maybe?” I continued. “So many possible reasons, but no obvious answer. What do you have to add, Ms. Badger?”

“Don’t make me break your fucking nose again, Wilde.”

“And Ms. Badger refuses to comment.”

She trudged over to me and gave me a mocking punch. “What’re you doing up at six in the morning anyway?” She leaned against the counter behind her as I thought of my answer.

I shifted my arms from their crossed state to my pockets and pursed my lips for a few seconds, looking down.

“Well, I said I needed this collar to try and find my mom. I was hoping maybe you’d help me track her down before you headed out?”

I turned my head over to the badger to see sympathetic eyes staring back at me.

“Of course I’ll help you Nick. I just don’t know how I’d be able to do that…” She rapidly avoided my gaze, disappointed in her own lack of resourcefulness.

I scratched the back of my head, attempting to think of how Honey would play into all of this. “I mean, she must be somewhere in Happytown, right? I can’t really navigate my way around here. All I need is an address and you could help me get there.”

She gave a smile when I mentioned there was something she could do to pitch in. “I can help you get there, but I’m not sure how we’ll find her address. What’s her name? We could ask around, see if someone knows her.”

“Her name’s Ella, Ella Wilde.”

Honey’s small, fuzzy ears twitched at the name.

“Wait, Ella the fox?”

“...uh, yeah. I don’t know if you know this, Honey, but foxes come from foxes.”

She shook her head. “No, it’s just that I know a fox named Ella. Well...I did. I haven’t seen her in a while.” Honey chewed the inside of her cheek and rubbed her arm. “But her last name isn’t Wilde, though. It’s Foxtrot.”

Now it was time for my ears to twitch. “That’s her! Foxtrot’s her maiden name!” I blurted out in excitement. “Where does she live?”

“Just a few blocks away. I have more than enough time to take you there before work...it’s just-”

“Well what are we waiting for? Let’s go!” I pushed myself away from the counter and raced to the door, ecstatic to finally see my mom again. I held the door open and turned to see Honey still in the same spot, hesitantly biting her lip. 

“Come on! Let’s go!” I hurried her, frantically motioning a paw outside the doorway.

She let out a hopeless sigh and slowly followed me.

Once her door was locked and she was out of the apartment, she led me down the street, the opposite way from the hospital. Mosquitoes buzzed past my face as we made our way down the block, the orange sunlight streaming down through the clouds. I shielded my sensitive eyes with my paw as the fluffy barrier made way, letting the glow beam down upon the badger and me.

The setting reminded me immensely of my previous attempt to rekindle my relationship with my mother. Seeing the seemingly endless cracks in the pavement, lack of care for the environment, and limited street lamps that would prove useless without the sun filled me with bad memories. I had to do anything possible to avoid making the same mistakes again. With the introduction of shock collars to the public, we needed each other more now than ever.

Neither of us spoke as we traversed another crosswalk, as the heat was too blaring to waste any breath. My mouth was parched like no tomorrow, the nervousness of what was soon to come not being a helpful element in the matter.

Honey wiped her brow, drawing off a bead of sweat, and puffed out her cheeks to blow out a gush of air.

“Should be this next building on the left, if I remember correctly,” she pointed out.

It wasn’t the same place she lived before, but it was damn near close. The splits in the concrete grew intriguing artistic patterns, only to be ruined by my toes nearly getting caught inside the gaps. The condo was run down. Hell, it even smelled the same; old milk and piss.

But things were going to be different this time. I was going to make things right, and I wouldn’t have to involve such negatives with my mother anymore.

The two of us headed inside.

* * *

 

When I was still living with my mom, after my dad left and before I was involved on the wrong side of the law, my mother and I used to have TV nights. She knew I was never too keen on movies, I didn’t have the proper attention span, so we both curled up on the couch and caught up on any of the several shows we were following.

These nights were especially nice. It made me feel safe. My mom had started to do this with me after I’d been violently rejected from the Junior Ranger Scouts; she figured I needed some quality time with her. We would sit there for hours, sometimes talking instead of actually watching the television, and she would even sometimes get us ice cream to enjoy.

I always remembered my mom being a lot cooler than all of the other parents in the neighborhood, too. She let me watch shows with swearing, and sometimes even blood, which for a kid was practically the coolest thing in the world. To be able to share such fond times with her was truly a blessing.

One night, we were in the middle of watching a pilot for a high school drama. There was a goat who couldn’t make friends with anybody, and he went through a whole ordeal trying to “gain some popularity”. The show was shitty, and it never made it more than a season, but it really got me wondering as I was spread out on the sofa with my mom.

“Hey Mom?” I asked in my innocent ten-year-old voice, breaking my attention from the program.

“Hm?” She replied, not taking her eyes off the screen.

“Why doesn’t that goat have any friends?”

She gave me quick look before turning back to pause the show. Remote gripped in hand, she answered. “Now why do you think he doesn’t have any friends?”

I shrugged and started to rub my shoulder. “I don’t know...nobody wants to play with him. Friends have people to hang out with, right?”

The vixen opened her mouth a moment, before hesitantly closing it and rethinking her statement.

“Well-” she let out an irritated sigh.

“Sorry,” I speedily apologized, avoiding eye contact and hoping she’d turn the tv back on. I thought I’d upset her, and I’d learned with my dad that there would be consequences if I don’t realize and immediately repent my harmful actions.

“No, no, Nicky, it’s fine. You did nothing wrong.” She gently reached a paw a caressed my face, shifting it back in her direction. “I just wasn’t sure how to answer. I don’t think that goat has friends because...well because nobody would give him a chance. I bet everybody in that school would be friends with him actually, if they got to know him better, but they were being disrespectful. That’s why I always want you to give everybody a fair shot, alright Nicky?”

“But-, but why wouldn’t they give  _ him _ a shot?” I expressed, ignoring her question.

“What do you mean?”

“You say that they’d be friends with him if they got to know him better. But they didn’t. Why would they do that if they could make a new friend?”

She pressed her lips and nodded her head in understanding, making sense of my heightened curiosity.

“Nicky, did you see any  _ other _ goats in that school?”

I sat awhile in thought, thinking back upon what I’d seen of the episode so far, before shaking my head no.

“Now that’s the thing, Nicky. They don’t like him because...because he’s  _ different _ is all.”

“But what does that have to do with anything?”

“...the things is people don’t particularly  _ like _ different things. They can be...how do I put this…” She shifted her legs on top of the couch with her so they were under her body. “Mammals find different things scary, Nicky. And when people get scared, they can do some stupid, hurtful things. Do you understand?”

I remained silent, looking down. Without me noticing, tears had started to form in my eyes; tears of confusion. Noticing this, my mom held my head in both paws and wiped away the streams with her thumbs.

“Are you okay, Nicky? What’s wrong?” she questioned me in concern.

I stared her down, the liquid tracing my retinas distorting my vision. She looked kind of like she was standing in a hall of mirrors.

“Everyone at school is afraid of me, mom.”

Her mouth hung open, a wave of sympathy washing away all other features. She was still slightly taller than me when kneeling on the couch, but she leaned down and scooped me into her embrace, letting me grip the back of her shirt and allowing the tears to flow freely.

“Is it because I’m different, mom? They d-, they don’t  _ like  _ me!” I cried, the cloth my mouth was pressed against muffling my voice.

“Shhh shhh shhh, it’s gonna be okay Nicky. It’ll be alright.”

“All they do is stay away from me like I’m bad! I’m not a bad mammal, I swear!”

“I know Nicky, I know you aren’t.”

“And when I try to talk to them they don’t answer me! All because of who I am!”

“Nicky-”

“Why do I have to be a fox-”

“ _ NICK!” _

The sudden outburst drove me away from the hug, making me scurry back towards the armrest of the couch in fear of a punishment. I could see dribbles of fresh tears leaving dampened marks on the front of her shirt.

She sighed. “Nicky, I’m gonna tell you this now because I don’t want you to get any wrong ideas in the real world. It’s not your fault that you’re a fox. It really isn’t. It’s everybody else’s faults for prejudging foxes. Like I said before, they find us different, and for some reason that makes us scary, even if we’re just average mammals like you and me. They think we’re untrustworthy because of those prejudgements though, and that really isn’t fair. But the world isn’t going to show us justice, Nicky. At least it won’t right now…”

She had her paws palm-down on her thighs, staring deep into my soul to make her words strike every inch of my body.

“B-b-, but what should I do?”

My mom crawled forward and brought me back into her arms, cradling me with her warmth.

“Keep doing what you always do. Never let them see that they get to you.”

* * *

 

“Ya say ya lookin’ for Foxtrot?”

A pudgy, elderly, female polar bear sat behind a desk at the lobby of the dirty condo. Water stains greased the walls, and bits of the rug on the floor were torn out, revealing the floorboards underneath. The rest of the room was just as dimly lit as Happytown at night, with a few lamps tinting the room red, giving it a mysterious neo-noir look.

“Yes, Ella Foxtrot,” Honey replied. “I’ve been here a few times before to check up on... to  _ see _ her.”

The polar bear squinted her eyes judgingly at the badger, looking back and forth between me and her.

“This some kind of joke? I’m busy, get lost.”

Her lack of apathy took me aback, worrying me about whether or not this was the right place, if my mom was even in Zootopia at all.

“What do you mean is it a joke?” Honey retaliated, leaning onto one leg and putting her paws on her hips. “We just want to see her is all.”

“Yeah. Uh huh. And I’m the mayor of fucking Zootopia. Like hell you wanna see her. Get out of here before I call the ZPD.”

“Excuse me? Miss?” I interjected, holding up a finger to get her attention. “Um, miss…”

“Grizzoli.”

“Of course, Ms. Grizzoli. My friend and I here certainly don’t mean any inconvenience to you or any other mammal in this fine establishment, we simply want to visit someone.”

She snorted in reply.

I stood there, considering my next viable courses of action. I held out my paw for a shake.

“Nick Foxtrot, at your service. It’s been quite some time since I’ve stopped by to say hello to my mother. This appointment is  _ long _ overdue, you see.”

Ms. Grizzoli’s expression softened. “Y-you’re Ella’s son?” she asked incredulously. She reached out her paw skeptically and gripped mine, trying to make the up and down of the shake as quick as possible, before she let go and looked down, fur appearing even whiter than before.

“But...weren’t you attacked?” she continued. “By The Purifiers?”

I gave a brief chuckle, rolling my eyes. “It’s gonna take a bit more than a few prey to take this fox down,” I said proudly.

“Ella told me all about it.” The polar bear stared at me in disbelief, as if she was witnessing a living miracle. “I never thought...I never thought you’d wake back up.”

I held out my arms. “Here I am! Now, about seeing dear old Ms. Foxtrot…”

“Um…” she squeezed her paws together in discomfort. “About that, Mr. Wilde...uh...I don’t know how to say this…”

I felt a hint of pressure on my shoulder, and saw Honey’s clawed paw gripping me. She looked me in the eyes.

“Nick, your mom wasn’t doing so good healthwise while you were out…”

I backed away from Honey’s contact, not wanting to believe her implications.

“What do you mean? She’s okay right?” My eyes darted between the badger and polar bear frantically, trying to wrap my head around things.”

“Mr. Foxtrot,” the polar bear finally spoke, “Ms. Foxtrot passed away over two and a half years ago…”

I left her.

An unignorable pressure formed onto my chest, nearly making me double over from the emotional pain her words caused me. She continued to speak, but her words went in one ear and out the other. Honey appeared to be calling out my name, trying to get a response.

I wasn’t paying attention to any of that, though. I had left my mother, twice, every time that she needed me most; and she died alone. I wasn’t there for her. 

I left her.

The mother that raised me by herself. The mother that protected me from an awful father to the best of her abilities. The mother that loved and cared for me no matter what...

I left her.

“Nick!”

I shook my head and was snapped back to my senses. My arms felt fuzzy, my breathing was raspy; it didn’t feel like I was standing on my feet.

In fact, I  _ wasn’t _ standing on my feet. Honey arched over me, holding me up on my knees in one paw and rubbing my back with the other. Her eyes were glued to my collar.

An explosion of pain hit me all at once, making me fall over and hit my head on the reception desk sitting next to me. Bullet ants crawled all over my neck, biting and tearing at every inch of flesh left unharmed. I tried to cry out, but all that came out were scratchy husps of air.

“Nick! Holy shit are you okay? You collar’s been shocking you for like a whole minute!” The worried badger explained in a frenzied tone.

The pain still lingered, but it stopped coming in time in time again at full force. My arms went limp to my sides as I desperately tried to catch my breath.

I left her.

Darkness.


	10. Guilty by Association

My collar had been green for the past 3 days.

I stuck to the same routine as before. Honey went off to work and I wallowed in self-pity in Honey’s apartment. It was nice to see nothing had changed.

My throat was excruciatingly sore, but for some reason I didn’t care. It felt like I let something small and shit-ridden crawl inside of my windpipe and die, but nothing smelled off. I stubbed my toe but didn’t wince. My eyes were bloodshot but they didn’t sting. There was nothing to be felt.

I didn’t even know if I could attribute this to what had happened either. I hadn’t thought of my mom since I learned of her...passing, but I wasn’t actively ignoring it either. I had come to terms with the fact that I’d let her down. There wasn’t anything I could do now. 

But I wasn’t moving on either.

I was stuck in limbo. I knew that she was gone, she was gone from my life and my mind, but I couldn’t move on. Something was holding me back. Something felt useless, pointless. Something inside of  _ me _ . I was the problem in an unfixable situation. Getting this fucking collar all for nothing wasn’t doing much to solve anything.

Before becoming a full time doctor at the hospital, Honey spent her hours as a care worker for my mom. She went in three times a day to feed, clothe, wash, and accompany the dying vixen. Honey was moved to my ward before my mother passed away, so she was never made aware of our relation.

Honey carefully explained to me how my mother went out. Learning this didn’t make me feel any better to say the least. She’d developed a serious heart disease, most likely brought on by stress, and had lived the last few years of her life bedridden and under extreme fatigue. She couldn’t stand up without assistance and was lucky to leave her home more than once a week. She died before she was even 70 years old.

Honey tried to make it as clear to me as possible that my mom had been a fighter. No matter how anxious she was, no matter how bad of a shape she was in, her collar never so much as flickeredyellow. The badger still doesn’t know how to explain it. In the few months she spent caring for my mother, it never went off. She approached every day optimistically, with a beaming smile on her face.

My mom talked about me every chance she could get. She never mentioned my name, but she always talked about how much she wanted to see me again. How much she wanted to hold me, talk to me.

But she never got to do any of that.

She never said anything negative. Honey said my mom always talked about how sweet and kindhearted her son was, neither mentioning my shady profession nor my sudden abandonment of her.

She also never ran out stories to tell about me. Honey recounted some of the many she had been told over the few months she looked after the vixen, several of which even I had forgotten about. There was a particularly funny one when I was a little kit playing outside and decided to climb into the hole of a large tree. When I came back inside my mother found me matted and sticky, covered head to toe in sap.

She talked about the son she would never see again every day, but never brought up a single fault. My mother may have never got to hold me again, but that didn’t stop her from reminiscing upon everything that made her love me in the first place.

The one decent thing I’d found in this whole scenario was how she finally slipped away. She died peacefully in her sleep and was found by the replacement caretaker the next morning. She suffered no pain.

It’d happened not too long after Honey was moved back to the hospital, and for some reason, Honey was never notified of my mom’s passing. She was reticent to take me to see her because she knew how bad her condition was, but was never made aware that she had actually died. Honey apologized profusely for making such a mistake but I refused to even acknowledge it. It wasn’t her fault anyways.

It was mine.

Nobody was to blame blame but me. I could’ve helped her, I could’ve made her feel loved. Even if I couldn’t solve her health problems, I could’ve at least been there when she need me the most.

But I wasn’t. I ditched her, twice, and then got shot in the fucking head. She died before I could tell her I loved her…

_ No. _

My paws gripped my skull to the point where I received a headache. I let my chest heave down in a sigh and sat up on the couch of the main floor in Honey’s apartment. With my arms wrapped around my legs I buried my muzzle into my knees.

_ This won’t get me anywhere. I left her. I know that. That’s a given. But those bastards attacked me out the blue and prevented me from seeing her one last time. Maybe if I wasn’t in a coma I could’ve seen her… _

I raised a paw to my face and felt the small indentation in my skull left from the bullet that penetrated it years ago. The fur covered all discoloration and any abnormalities couldn’t be seen, but I could always feel the little ridge on my head that reminded me of the mammals that took away the last chance I’d ever have to see my mother again.

_ And now I have a collar...for nothing…I-... _ fuck!

_ I can pin this on myself all I want, but those sorry pieces of shit will continue to fuck over mammals like me until there are no predators left to ruin. I need to do something. I owe it to myself. I owe it to  _ her…

I didn’t know what to do though. The only sliver of hope that shined through was Daniel’s pred resistance, but by the looks of it, they were getting nowhere. Still, they might have been onto something.

Removing Judy from the picture could definitely leave an impact. Seeing the way every prey in the city looks up to her, admires her for what she does, it might take a toll on their prejudice if she stepped down from the face of their kind. All of her propaganda had managed to ease nearly all of Zootopia into this hateful mindset. Taking said propaganda away could help ease a newer generation out of it…

_ How do I even manage to reach her though? I sure as hell don’t wanna get assaulted in the streets again just trying to speak with her. There’s gotta be some other way. _

The jingling of keys and clicking of a lock broke me out of my stupor. In walked Honey, her arms wrapped around two brown paper bags most likely full of groceries. She kicked her foot and closed the door without setting anything down. The large bags rose up next to her head, making it appear as if her face was the inside of a sandwich. She noticed me sitting on the couch and hurried over to the kitchen to put everything away.

I put my muzzle back into my knees. 

The sinking of the cushions spread out more evenly along the seat, and I flicked my eyes up to see the badger sitting right in front of me.

Her sympathetic amber irises met my apathetic green ones.

“How’s it been going?” she asked softly.

Honey lifted a leg up on the couch with her, draping an elbow across her knee to make herself more comfortable.

“...it’s been going…”

I was looking right at her but my mind was too far away to process sight effectively. All I had was sound.

“Is that really all you’re gonna say to me, Nick?”

Words bounced around in my brain, but weren’t successful enough to elicit a response.

The badger licked her lips and cracked her knuckles before heaving herself back up to her feet with a grunt. She clasped her paws behind her back as she walked around the room.

“I’m worried about you, Nick,” she muttered as she paced. “You’ve barely said anything for three days and...and I don’t know what to do with you.”

I remained transfixed, staring at whatever my head was pointed towards. I was numb, unaware of what my eyes were seeing.

“Look, I’m sorry about your mom, Nick, but what you need to do right now is talk to me.”

“...”

“You can’t expect me to let you mope around my house the entire day for the rest of your life. That’s just not how things work. I want to help you, I really do, but we have to be reasonable here.”

“...”

“If I had known about what happened before I brought you to visit her, trust me, I would’ve done everything in my power to make this at least a  _ little _ more comfortable; but we can’t live in the past. I feel terrible. I know that you feel terrible. You have to let me in.”

“...”

I heard the patter of footsteps die down until it was at a complete halt. I was left with a mild ringing in my ears from the stillness of the air. The noises picked up again, growing closer to me until they were right next to the couch.

Something brushed against my cheek, and again I felt the couch shift. My head was pulled into an embrace, my lifeless arms falling limply from their grip on my legs as my body came to rest against something soft and warm. I again felt something  on my cheek, this time the other one.

I sniffed up any fluids threatening to drip from my nose as I let the badger bathe me in her tranquility, ignoring the dropping of my tears.

I refused to let my collar turn yellow.

* * *

 

“I just don’t see what you’re proposing we do.”

I took a long sip of water, allowing the freezing liquid soothe the stinging of my collar-induced burns. I let out a satisfied ‘ahhh’ as I let the cup drop back down onto the kitchen table Honey and I currently sat at.

“Asshole the Otter said it himself. We gotta take Judy outta the spotlight. What else?”

The badger furrowed her eyebrows. “Yeah, I mean but...how?”

“We’re gonna have to figure that out. Invite him over.”

“But I didn’t call a meeting.”

“Call one then. We’re having one tonight. I’m gonna get something done if it’s the last thing I do.”

Honey sat a moment to give herself time to consider.

“If you think we can actually get something done….then what the hell?.”

I brought  the water back to my lips as Honey roamed the room dialing the number.

“Daniel? Hey, it’s Honey. Get me Huskins and Houndinski, we’re gonna have a meeting... What do you think? Yes, now.”

* * *

 

Daniel took his designated “seat” by standing atop of the fold-up table in Honey’s panic room. The two wolves sat - arms crossed - on either side of him. 

“So what exactly has changed since the last time I visited?” the otter asked accusingly, a scowl visible on his face.

“Not really anything. I guess Nick had a hunch or something.” Honey replied.

I nodded from my place on the bean bag chair, facing away from the rest of the group.

Daniel decided he’d rather just cut to the chase. “What is it, Wilde?”

I cleared my throat and shifted in my seat, resting one leg over the other. 

“Hopps still cares about me. I can tell. Behind that whole innocent little game she’s playing, I can tell she feels bad.” I turned to look at the rest of the mammals in the room. “I just need to wiggle it out of her.”

“That’s it?” the otter burst out, throwing his arms out to the side. “Your master plan is to  _ talk  _ to the bunny?” He snapped his fingers at his two assistants. “Get yourselves ready to leave, gentlemen, I think we’re just gonna have to settle for a hitmammal afterall.”

“Won’t work,” I stated bluntly.

Daniel crossed his arms and started to tap his foot in irritation. “And why the hell not? All the prey in this city adores her, butthe bitch has it coming. Seems like a win-win to me.”

“Well, I can’t argue with the latter, but if you kill her, they’ll just have her replaced. The only way we can do this is to get her to clean the system from the inside out. Either slowly drop the whole ‘preds are bad’ charade, or get her to soften the propaganda techniques. Trust me, Dan, I’ve hustled her before, I can hustle her again.”    

The badger lifted a finger to protest but I was too quick and interjected.

“ _ And _ considering how big of a threat ‘The Purifiers’ appear to be, we would need to fix things from the inside out either way. There’s no way the city hall and the media aren’t working together to cover this up. They blatantly ignored facts in their news reports to keep prey in the dark, then they post a pretty picture of Hopps on the screen and suddenly everyone feels at ease again. I’m not saying we need to side with her - in fact I’m quite against that - but we surely need some sort of wrench to fix this leaky pipe.”

“Did you  _ really  _ just compare this to a leaky pi-?”

“Not now, Honey.”

“Okay, fine, let’s say you manage to convince the bunny to help us,” Daniel interjected. “How in the everliving  _ fuck _ do you expect to be able to talk to her?”

“That’s where you come into play, my angry little friend. I don’t need to make the plans, I just run my mouth. I bet you can think of something useful.”

The otter squinted at me, attempting to have some sort of tension-building staring contest, before he dropped his gaze and motioned to his friends.

“I’ll try and figure something out in the next few days,” he muttered as he hopped off the table. “Can’t believe I wasted a whole fucking trip here for something that could’ve been said over the phone.” The otter made his way up the ladder with the wolves closely stalking behind.

I adjusted my tie. “See Honey?  _ Now  _ we’re getting somewhere.”

She pursed her lips. “I’m not so sure about this... I still think she may be the one tricking  _ you _ .”

“I’ve been doing this since I was born, Honey. Nobody hustles me.”

“There’s no way she would just  _ act nice  _ to you. No cops would ever help out a pred getting beaten on the street.”

I chuckled. “Yeah, well Judy would; and I plan to use something like that to my glorious advantage, Ms. Badger.”

Honey moved her chair closer to where I was seated and plopped herself down. “Ya know, he’s right. That was literally like a one minute conversation. You could’ve just told him over the phone.”

I let a smirk take over me. “Oh, trust me, I know. I just wanted that asshole to get pissed off.”

Honey let out a snort. “Wow. Okay. If anything,  _ you’re  _ the asshole here, Wilde.”

“You just keep on saying that, Badger, because you know you love this asshole.”

“Pfft. Yeah right.”

We sat there a few seconds until our smiles faded away.

I looked down at my paws and started to twiddle my thumbs. “With all the stuff that happened recently, I kinda forgot… any word on what’s going on with Clyde ... Parker? The mink kid at the hospital?”

“Holy shit...with everything that’s gone down I forgot about it too.”

“So...did you check up on him? Like you said you would?”

“Huh? Yeah, of course I did. I just completely forgot to mention him. You barely even replied when I asked if you wanted to eat food.”

“He's okay, right? Is his mom alright?”

Honey blinked a few times and paused to scratch the back of her neck. “She's uh...s-she's probably not gonna make it. She was dangerously close to the source of the blast. Lots of internal damage…”

I looked down.

“Oh…”

I rubbed my nose.

“Um...i-is he still at the hospital? Is he alright?”

“We're keeping him there for now. His injuries aren't serious; minor flesh wound on his face, but at his age we can't let him go back to his house alone. We’ll have him staying with us until further notice.”

“It’s just that…” I scratched the other side of my paw and shifted uncomfortably in my seat. “-What happens if... if his mom dies?”

Honey looked up at me for a moment, taken aback by the question.

“I-, I really don’t know…”

I nodded my head, sad to have to accept that the worst could be inevitable. Losing my mother and then finding out that some kid was so close to the same experience filled me with a tide of unrelenting sympathy.

_ I need to talk to him. _

“Is he there right now?” I pried.  
“At the hospital? Yeah.”

“I wanna talk to him.”

* * *

 

The temperature had dropped to something only slightly bearable in the three days I’d spent moping around. The sun had set just a few hours prior, so Honey and I had to rely on our night vision due to the lack of street lamps. She stuck close to my side, since her sight in complete darkness wasn’t as good as mine.

In a matter of minutes we were inside the hospital, the much cooler air stark and relieving juxtaposition to the heat we’d endured. Honey led me towards an intensive care ward, having me wait outside of the room while she went to go fetch Clyde.

I leaned back against the wall by the door and glanced around. The place looked like a quarantine zone. The walls were pure white, everything looked clean, and almost nobody was to be seen.

My ears twitched as I made out muffled speaking. I decided to ignore any words that made it through the walls to avoid picking up anything private and focused purely on my surroundings.

_ How does anyone work here? It’s straight out of a fucking horror story… _

I shot up in attention when the door opened and glanced down to see the scraped up mink looking up at me with tired eyes while Honey stayed in the room with his mother.

“Hey, buddy,” I greeted in a soothing voice. “How’s it going?”

“It’s been going,” he replied shakily, immediately lowering his eyes down to his feet.

I felt a small grin tug at my lips, amused by how this mirrored my answer to Honey’s concerns earlier.

“You need someone to talk to right now?” 

The boy remained silent.

I let out a sigh and got down on one knee to look at him on his level.

“Look, I know you’re going through a tough time. Things are going to be okay, I promise.”

Clyde’s glossy eyes met mine, streams of tears spewing from them leaving the fur below damp.

“Sh-sh-she’s g-gonna _ die  _ though…” His stare went back down.

I shut my eyes a brief moment at the bluntness of his comment. I brought a paw onto his shoulder and gripped it comfortingly.

“Clyde? I-”

“Why are you here?”

It took a minute for the  words to sink in, the sudden harshness of his voice unnerving me. 

“What do you mean? I wanted to check up on you.”

He brushed my paw off of his shoulder with his own, wiping away any remaining tears with the other.

“I barely even know you.” While his voice was still trembling with hurt, the sadness that was once clear in it could be made out as confusion and anger. 

“Why are you here?” he repeated.

I opened and closed my mouth a few times before I could figure out something to say.

“I just...I thought maybe you’d need someone to talk to.”

The mink stared up at me in bewilderment, clearly not satisfied with my answer.

“I...um,” I continued, “It’s important that you’re here for your mom when she needs you the most. Don’t forget that.”

Clyde was immediately defensive. “I haven’t left her side since I got here. I  _ have  _ been here for her. I know that she needs me.”

He gave one more quick rub of his eyes and said, “I think I should go. I don’t know how much longer she’s gonna be around…”

He wrapped his fingers around the knob, but before he could push the door open, I grabbed his arm, probably with more force than I should have used. 

“Wait, Clyde, I-...I really do care. I know we just met and all and it seems weird but…” 

I started to massage my temples, struggling to even make sense of  _ myself _ . 

“I wasn’t there for my mom when she needed me most, and...a-and I guess I just needed to see that you weren’t making the same mistakes I made.”

His eyebrows furrowed and he stared at me, trying to make sense of what I’d said. 

Finally, he wordlessly turned the doorknob and stepped inside. Honey came out to take his place shortly afterward. Thankfully, she sensed that things hadn’t gone well. We didn’t talk the whole way back.

It was only as I began to fall asleep that night that I realized what I’d attempted.

I tried to gain closure from a kid’s dying mom.


	11. They're Here

_ Knock* Knock* Knock* _

Honey had left for work nearly four hours ago, so there was nothing to keep me from being enveloped in my thoughts yet again. I kept the shades drawn, light was far too offensive for my current state of mind. Just as I’d started to deal with my mother’s death, Clyde had shoved me right back into the depressed mood I was in.

_ Knock* Knock* Knock* _

But I was being selfish. Everything had to be about me, and now it had come to bite me in the ass. Nothing on this planet had improved since I’d recovered from my coma, and realizing it was like a punch to the gut.

_ Knock* Knock* Knock* _

What was I supposed to do? If I couldn’t fix anything here, what’s the point? Assuming we  _ could  _ fix anything, would it be worth it for me to stick around the city afterwards?

_ Knock* Knock* Knock* _

Wait...who’s knocking at the door?

_ “The little shit ain’t openin’ up. Knock ‘er down, boys.” _

“Oh fuck,” I swore under my breath.

I leapt up from the couch, unsure of what to do. The accent sounded vaguely familiar. If that was who I thought it was, I was in deep shit. I frantically whipped about the room, desperately searching for a place to hide. My gaze suddenly locked on the kitchen cabinet.

_ Of course. _

I scurried over to the entrance of the bunker and climbed in just as I heard a splintering crack at the door. I just managed to close the cabinet at the same moment the front door burst open.

Extra cautiously, I shuffled down into the bunker entrance, keeping the trapdoor open just a crack to keep an eye out for any intruders. My paws clutched desperately onto the rungs of the ladder, my head propping open the trapdoor above me.

_ “Randy,”  _ a muffled voice crept through the cabinet to my ears, interrupting the quiet flow of dust,  _ “I thought you said he’d be here.” _

_ “‘E’s gotta be, I swear,”  _ a familiar-sounding mammal replied defensively. _ “Ain’t got a job or nuffin’ _ , _ and ‘e was ‘ere when me and the boys came to get ‘im collared up.” _

_ “Hm, curious. Search the room. If he is here, I don’t want him going unnoticed.”  _ The monotony in his was blunt enough to kill.

I stifled a short breath. They were definitely the same hare and pig from my clinic visit —no doubt about that— but clearly there weren’t here for a social call. I thought back to the suspicious comments they had made when they thought I was out of earshot. They had said I was ‘the same fox.’ It was obvious now, they were Purifiers.

And what was it Honey had said to me about the Purifiers?

‘ _...they’re not gonna be too happy if they find out they let one of their victims live… _ ’

They had come to finish what they started three years ago.

_ BANG* _

Violent noises of pots, pans, and plates being thrown made my skin crawl, while the noises of the pantries being torn off their hinges made me jump. They were ransacking Honey’s apartment just to be certainly wasn’t here. 

The banging and splintering of wood grew ever closer to my position as the intruders ravaged every nook and cranny of the kitchen. My eyes darted around the dusty ladder, following the sounds as they got closer and closer to where I was staring over the lip of the bunker entrance. 

A massive impact rattled the cabinet door directly in front of me. _  
__Oh fuck, they’re right here!_

I lowered myself farther down the ladder, letting the door to the bunker fall shut without the  support of my head. I froze as the bunker door made a dangerously loud clank as it closed completely.

_ Shit. _

My ears perked as the cabinet doors opened. I steadied myself until I was nearly holding my breath. The metal of the ladder was cold to the touch, but I was certain my paws were colder. 

I couldn’t hear anything for the next few seconds. My stomach twisted into knots as I realized I’d been caught.

_ “Something wrong there, Randy?” _

My heart was pounding out of my chest as I desperately tried to control my breathing.

_ “No. No, I fought I ‘eard somefin’, but it’s nuffin’.” _

_ “Probably an insect or something. Did you  _ see  _ the amount of bees this fox has in his kitchen? I didn’t even think something as disgusting as a  _ fox _ would eat shit like  _ that. _ ” _

_ “Wait…’old on a sec.” _

_ “Hm?” _

_ “I fink ‘e lives ‘ere wif someone. A badger or some shit. Bet dat explains the bugs.” _

_ “...well then I guess we’d better figure out where to find her instead.” _

And just like that, the intruders left. I could have heard the footsteps of an ant in the silence that followed.

For what felt like an eternity, I was frozen to the spot. Unable to do anything but cling to the ladder. 

Finally, tentatively, I climbed out of the bunker.

The house was devastated, completely torn apart. Honey’s belongings were thrown everywhere; every closet and pantry was open, but something immediately caught my eye.

Sloppily written in bold, black spray paint on one of the walls of the kitchen were the words:  
“ **Sic semper, carnivores”**

* * *

 

I waited a few minutes before I left the apartment to be sure that any lingering Purifiers wouldn’t spot me on my way out. I ran down the stairs — two steps at a time — and sprinted as fast as my legs could take me to the hospital. My aversion to regular exercise coupled with the heat of the glaring sun. had me sweating bullets by the time I was just a block down the street.

Adrenaline convinced me to ignore the wheezing noises of my raspy breaths. I was going to be tired as hell later, but I had to get to Honey.

I charged into the hospital and bursted through the doors, earning me more than a few puzzled looks from those in the waiting room.

I dashed past the front desk, ignoring the protests of the brown bear sitting there, completely focused on the task at paw. 

I _had_ to get Honey out of here, and fast. 

The problem was, I had no idea where to find her. 

It wasn't exactly a huge hospital, but it was big enough to get lost in. The similarity of every hallway I turned into disoriented me. I slid around each corner with high hopes, only to be tricked into thinking I was back in the hallway I’d just left. 

Finally, I came upon a familiar place. But unlike yesterday, something about the place unnerved me. The walls were so white they blinded me, and the stink of sadness wafted up into my nose at every turn. The hallway was completely empty; for a minute I wondered if I was the last mammal left alive in the world. It was discomforting, scary even. 

Without a thought, I reached my paw for the closest doorknob. 

I was met with Clyde Parker’s piercing gaze; eyes staring daggers into my soul. I tore my gaze away from the mink to fixate on the badger whom had her back facing me. Honey hovered over a broken figure, whom was very similar in looks though slightly larger than the other mink in the room. Mrs. Parker looked as bad as I felt when I woke up from my prolonged coma. Her body was practically half mammal, half machine; a large, clear mask covered nearly the entirety of her face, a dripping IV leading into her frail, limp left arm.

Her eyes were open. She was awake, and she was in pain.

Honey turned around to look at me, her eyes widening in surprise.

“Nick? What the  _ hell  _ are you doing here?” she questioned.

“Honey, we need to go.”

Her eyebrows furrowed as a baffled look spread across her face.

“What do you mean? Go where?”

“You were right, Honey. Oh  _ fuck _ , you were fucking right!” I brought a paw to massaged my temples and tried to get ahold of myself. “They wanna fucking kill me and now they're looking for you! All because I couldn't just fucking  _ die  _ like I was supposed to and I don't think I ca-”

“Nick! Calm down? What's goin on? Who's looking for us?”

I took a deep breath and looked at Honey straight in the eyes.

“The Purifiers, Honey. They know I'm still alive.”

Her arms fell to her sides as she stood in shock. She slumped like a rag doll into a nearby seat and buried her head in her paws. 

“Shit…” she muttered. “ _ Shit!” _

She rubbed her muzzle for a moment, trying to make sense of the sudden development.

“How did they find you?” She asked. “How long do we have?”

I sighed and clenched my eyes, not happy to be believing this myself.

“They were in your apartment, Honey. They probably have info on every pred in the city. I say we have a few hours at the very most before they figure out where to find you.”

She clenched her fur in her fists. “God fucking dammit!” 

Honey pushed herself out of her chair, sending it flying backwards into the wall. Clyde, watching from the side of the room, flinched at the sudden burst of rage and started nervously playing with his paws.

The badger’s face softened at his fear, and gave him a sympathetic look.

“Clyde, I um...I'm sorry. I need to go,” she stated apologetically.

The mink’s eyes widened. “W-what? B-but what about my mom?”

“I'm sorry, I-...it’s not safe for me to be here. But I’ll make sure another doctor comes by to take care of your mom, okay?”

Honey quickly shuffled out of the room, avoiding Clyde’s shocked gaze as she left. 

I started to rub the side of my arm. “Clyde, buddy, I-”

“Please, just leave,” he said quietly. “You can’t help us … you’re just making things worse.”

I opened my mouth, desperate to say  _ something, _ but nothing came out. Reluctantly, I left the room without a sound, right behind the badger.

* * *

 

“Tell me everything that's going on. We’ll be able to hide out in the bunker for a while, but I've got a feeling that's only a temporary solution.”

Honey and I walked as fast as we could along the Happytown streets, keeping our heads low and our voices lower.

“I was just sitting around your house when I heard someone knocking at the door. The guy sounded like that jackrabbit asshole who took me to get collared, so I hid in the bunker until they left ... They tore the whole fucking place apart looking for me. But before they left… th-they mentioned you; they knew I was staying with you. I knew I had to get to you before they did, so… here I am.”

“...shit, man.”

…

…

…

“Honey, what are we gonna do?”

“...I-...I don't think there's anything we  _ can  _ do.”

* * *

 

Honey stood in silence in the middle of her bunker, using an arm to prop up an elbow as she stroked her chin. She was chewing on her lip so forcibly it seemed painful. She twitched every once in awhile, to a point her collar shocked her.  
I kept my eyes on her, waiting for her to say something — _anything_ — about what we should do. I couldn’t think of any viable options, but we couldn’t just be sitting ducks. That would all but make our deaths a certainty.

“Honey?” I asked hesitantly.

She looked back at me, receiving another shock in the process. This time, however, she didn’t flinch. Not a word was said.

“Um...Madge?”

“…”  
“I-, um...shit. I’m so fucking sorry, Madge. I didn’t think that any of this would happen, and I just fucked _everything_ up and I don’t know what to do but I don’t want you here in this shitshow with me because none of this is your fault, it’s all mine, and-”

She held up a paw. “Enough, Nick. I’ve had enough.”

“...what do you mean?”

“Of all of…” she motioned around to nothing in particular, “... _ this. _ ”

“I-”

“Was it my choice to so courteously invite you into my home? Yes, yes it was. Was it me who made the arrangements to get you collared? Yes, yes it was. Was is me that let you get involved in our pred uprising shenanigans? Yes, yes it was.”

The badger advanced on me angrily, punctuating every question with a jab at her chest. She stopped in front of me and, with a heavy sigh, exhaustion blossomed across her face.

“I brought this upon myself, Nick. You had  _ very  _ risky problems that I was fully aware of, and if anything, I’ve just spread the flames of this raging fire myself. If I die, which in all honesty seems like the most probable foreseeable event, it’s not your fault. It’s mine.”

Honey looked back up at me and gave a small, weary smile.

“So quit the self-loathing crap,  and help me figure out how we get out of this."

“H-, I… okay,” I let out, giving a brisk nod of my head. “Okay, Honey. You’re right.”

“I know I am.”

I rolled my eyes, a short breath of laughter escaping me. “ _ Har har, _ Ms. Badger. No matter what the circumstance, you’re always ready and willing to give your ego a quick boost, huh?”

The badger smiled in return. “You read me like an open book, fox. So!” she clapped her paws together. “First order of business: We gotta find a place to hide out.”

“What, your loony bunker isn’t good enough?”

“Too risky. They know where we both live now. We can’t stay someplace that they might come snooping around again.”

I pursed my lips, struggling to find a way around the problem. “Well, I’d  _ like  _ to say that I know Zootopia like the back of my paw, but with such a  _ thriving and progressive  _ city as this, I have to assume quite a few things have changed while I was out, including potential allies.”

Honey briefly stroked her chin. “Allies…” she muttered in though. Suddenly she snapped her fingers, eyes lighting up. “Of course! Daniel!”

“Of course! Asshole the otter!” I replied with similar excitement.

Honey scoffed, dropping her arms to her side. “No, really, he’s our only way out of this shitstorm, Nick.”

“I know, I know...but he’s still an asshole.”

She gave me a playful punch on the shoulder. “Shut it. I’ll call him. With those two wolves guarding his ass and hitmammals in his contact list, I’m positive we’ll be safe with him.”

“Fair point,” I responded, nodding my head.

Honey trudged over to the edge of the ladder, placing her paws delicately over the rungs. 

But she didn’t climb.

She let her arms fall limply to her sides before she turned to me with a defeated sigh.

“I-, I have to go back up there to get the phone…”

I stared back at her, unsure of what to say, but desperate to do  _ something  _ to comfort her.

“They-, th-they ruined my house and…”

Tears started forming in her eyes.

“Nick, I’m scared. I’m so fucking scared.”

The next thing I knew she was in my embrace, her paws frantically trying to conduct a grip on the back of my shirt.

“ _ Shhhh shhhh _ ,” I soothed her. “We’re going to be alright, Madge. We’ll be fine.”

“They’re  _ looking _ for us, Nick.”

“We’ll get Daniel to pick us up, and we’ll go hide until this blows over.”

“A-and what if it doesn’t, huh?” She pulled herself away from me, paws still on my shoulders. The badger looked deep into my eyes. “What then?”

I took a glance at the ladder behind her.

“I, um...I’ll go get the phone,” I muttered.

I edged past her still figure and slowly climbed up to the latch above.

At the top, the destruction of Honey’s apartment finally sunk into me. This was the only place she was able to call home for the past three years, and it was completely and utterly ruined. Beyond the overturned tables, scraps of wood chips, and glass shards, I spotted Honey’s house phone. I speedily jogged over to it and picked it up, dusting off all traces of debris left behind on it. 

As I turned to head back into the bunker, my eye once again caught the message the Purifiers left for me.

“ **Sic semper, carnivores”**

The spraypaint had since bled down the wall, making every letter appear as if black tree roots were sprouting from the confines of each word.

It made me sick.

I went over the wall, holding out a paw to wipe away the sickening declaration.

It had already dried onto the wall.

I let out a low growl. Simply the presence of such a message on the walls of an innocent, hard-working predator, a badger that had done absolutely  _ nothing  _ to  _ anyone,  _ made me want to go on a murderous rampage. The mammals I was dealing with truly were despicable.

I couldn’t have this on display.

Without thinking, I brought up a clawed paw, slicing into the layer of paint on the wall. Dust of black spilled into the air, taking off a bit of the apartment’s wallpaper along with it. I continued viciously slashed at the phrase until it was illegible, the only indication of anything being there previously being the leftover scratch marks and the chips of paint staining into the fur of my right paw.

Without looking back, I headed back down into the bunker.

…

Honey held the phone up nervously to her ear, nervously chewing on the claws of her other paw. She tapped her foot against the floor as she waited for the other end to buzz.

I looked down at my own claws, picking out the excess flecks of paint left behind. Honey eyed the black chips falling to the floor from my paws, but seemed to be too focused on her incoming conversation with the otter. I used my thumb to pick off piece after piece that was stuck to my claws, watching the scraps fall in a pile to the floor.

“Daniel! Daniel, it’s Honey!”

My ears shot up as my attention focused back to the badger.

“No everything’s fucking peachy,” she continued sarcastically. “Nothing wrong, everything’s one-hundred percent okay. Nothing wrong here!”

She rolled her eyes as Daniel replied on the other end.

“Yes something’s wrong, you fucking idiot! We need Huskins and Houndinski to pick us up right fucking now and take us somewhere to hide!”

Her paw shot back into her mouth as she listened to what Daniel had to say.

“No Daniel, you fucking listen to me! We are  _ not safe  _ right now and need help.”

…

“Because, The...The Purifiers are after us.”

…

“...Daniel?”

…

Honey brought the phone away from her ear, only for her eyebrows to furrow in absolute disgust.

“Don’t fucking tell me that he actually…” I spoke up.

Honey apologetically looked up at me, and nodded her head in confirmation. Without hesitation I snatched the phone from her paw and redialed.

I pressed the phone up to my ear and heard a  _ click  _ after a few rings.

_ “Listen here, Honey. If you and your retarded fox friend wanna get yourselves killed, be my guests, but don’t bring me int-” _

“You’re going to listen to me  **very** carefully, Danny-boy. ” I interrupted. My voice remained steady and menacing, with a thrumming growl simmering underneath. “Those bastards were in Honey’s house, and if you don’t come help us right now, we’re as good as dead. We don’t have much time, so now would be  _ much  _ more preferable than later.”

“ _ I’m not fucking myself over for you, Wilde. This has absolutely nothing to do with me.” _

“You waited  _ three years  _ for me and you’re gonna give me up just like that?”

_ “Yes, yes I am.” _

My face fell. Honey’s expression grew more and more anxious as she watched me talk.

“ _ You see Nick, I thought you’d be needed for the operation I was planning to rid of that pest. Turns out I don’t. I have  _ no  _ use for you, and I’m sure as hell not giving up how close I am to fixing this for vermin like you. You and Honey being taken out of the picture is none of my concern, and within time, the bunny won’t be either. Good day.” _

My jaw dropped in sudden understanding.

“Daniel, you can’t seriously be planning to kill her. She’ll become a fucking martyr! That’ll just make things worse if anything!”

…

“Daniel? …  _ Daniel?! …  _ Fuck!” I threw my arms down, crying out frustratedly.

Honey stood still, keeping her distance as I blew off steam.

“I’m gonna kill that otter,” I snarled. “I’m going to  _ fucking kill hi-!” _

**_BZZZRT*_ **

A shock, albeit less painful than those I’d received before, burst through my neck.

“Nick?”

I looked up, eyes softening as I saw the frightened badger before me. I immediately took a deep breath, calming myself to speak to the badger.

“We need to go to Judy,” I declared bluntly.

“We...what?” she stammered, clearly taken aback.

“I...she...that bunny is the only mammal we have left to turn to.”

“Nick, you can’t be serious.”

I stared deep into Honey’s eyes, silently letting her know that I truly meant every word I was saying. The badger stumbled, falling back into the closest chair to her.

“Shit…” she whispered.

“I mean, I’d just as soon never lay eyes on that hypocrite again, b-but … “

I sighed heavily.

“But look, there’s no way the Judy I know would  _ willingly  _ support the slaughter of entire class of species, let alone someone who helped her solve the case that got her into her position of power. If we go to her, there’s definitely some place that she can hide us, at least until this blows over. What we do with her regarding her influence on the city will have to be considered later.”

Honey forcefully rubbed her eyelids. She took a while respond, but she eventually snapped her head up to mine.

“Please just tell me this is all some fucked up nightmare. I can’t...I can’t deal with this!”

“It’s our only opti-”

“Tell me Nick,” Honey interjected, getting up from her chair. “What if she really  _ isn’t  _ the bunny you think she is deep down. What if she wants to see us die, or even be  _ fucking tortured  _ to the brink of insanity? What if her face being advertised as a sign of prey power really is just what it sounds like: advertising prey power?”

She stepped closer to me, spreading out her arms.

“Look around you, Nick. This mess of a situation we have going on here can all be traced back to that bitch! Who’s to say she’ll help us?”

I looked down, sighing. I rubbed the bridge of my nose, letting the bubbles of stress in my head ooze down to my feet, until they eventually bled out of the pores of my skin into the concrete below.

“When I was younger…” I started. “I-, when I was younger my mom told me that mammals find different things scary. And when mammals get scared, they can do some stupid, hurtful things.”

I looked back up at Honey.

“I don’t think Judy hates predators, Honey. Maybe she’s a bit frightened of us, yes, but that’s all instinct and social influence if anything. I just …”

I paused, bringing a paw to rub at my temples.

“Look, even after everything she did to me, I think she was just put in a situation she couldn’t handle, and never had a fair chance to get out of it.”

Honey stayed silent, only moving to rub the top of her head, ultimately settling on wrapping her paws around the back of her skull, elbows pressed against the sides of her face. She looked directly into my eyes with a strong gaze. 

“Fine. Let’s go find her, then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sic semper: A shortened version of the Latin phrase, ‘sic semper evello mortem tyrannis,’ which translates to, ‘thus always I bring death to tyrants’.


	12. The Overdue Reconvening

I never thought I’d make use of Honey’s “sheep conspiracy” map of Zootopia.

The push pins on the map reflected disorienting patterns on the wall, letting string connect  them to form some sort of dizzying web. I raised a finger and traced it across the street in Savannah Central where I used to pull most of my cons. 

I made $200 a day running the same operation on the same place at the same time every day. Other mammals constantly suspected my actions because of my species, but it never stopped me from successfully pulling off a good scam.

I sighed.

_ Good times…good fucking times. _

“Uh, Nick?”

My ears perked up and I snapped my attention away from the map and turned around to see Honey, arms crossed and eyes looking at me curiously.

“Huh?” I stammered.

“What was it you wanted to show me again?”

I quickly looked back at the map, the dive into my memories bringing out a momentary brain fart. I turned back to the badger.

“Oh! Uh...police routes,” I finally got out.

Her expression of puzzlement didn’t change.

“...police routes?”

I nodded my head, bringing my paw back up to point out specific areas on the map.

“I know every single police route of every patrol unit in Zootopia. You gotta remain on edge if you wanna cheat people of their money.”

I gave a brief laugh, before clearing my throat and getting back to business.

“Anyway, um,” I glazed my eyes over a familiar looking street in the heart of the city and brought a finger up to it.

“Predator control is riiiiiight ...” I tapped my pawpad on a marked area of the map, “ _ here. _ Now once I got outside of the building, our good pal Officer Hopps was driving along this road.” I shifted my finger over to demonstrate what street I was talking about to the badger behind me.

I crossed my elbow and propped my other arm atop it, idly stroking my muzzle in thought.

“Now, if I remember correctly, that police route monitors the entirety of those streets, along with those of the next three intersections; which is about a third of Savannah Central. Now, if she happens to be on that shift, and we can catch her at the right time, we might get our ticket out of here.”

“And what if she doesn’t help us. Or better yet, she’s not even on patrol today!” Honey piped up.

I looked at her over my shoulder.

“Then we’re fucked, Honey. No sugarcoating, we’re royally fucked.”

She lowered her head downwards, sighing in the process.

“So what do you suggest we do? We can barely risk going out in public with the Purifiers on our asses, and even then we can’t go into a prey-populated area out of the blue. That’s like suicide.”

I turned my head back  to the map as I considered the situation.

“Honey, how's your sense of smell?” I asked.

“What? I don't know...fine, I guess. Why?”

“No reason, just wanted to know how well you'd be able to endure the constant smell of rotten shit.”

“...”

“Nick, I really hope you aren't considering what I think you’re considering.”

I chuckled. 

“Oh-ho-ho, but I am.”

A paw clenched onto my right shoulder, spinning me around. Honey was inches away from my face, a scowl plastered across her own. 

“Nick, I am  _ not  _ crawling through a fucking sewer for the  _ slim _ ,” she held her thumb and forefinger so they were barely touching each other, “and I highly emphasize ‘slim’, chance of Judy Hopps coming to our rescue.”

I raised my eyebrows.

“Fine. That's fair. One hundred percent, absolutely, purely, and in all ways, fair.” My finger shot up in the air. “But!” My finger traveled the small distance between the two of us, quickly tapping the badger on the nose. My smirk contrasted her visible annoyance. “And I  _ highly  _ emphasize the word ‘but’, what else do you suggest we do?”

Honey tensely raised her shoulders, clearly trying to think up a response. 

“I… I don't know, Nick. Just  _ anything  _ that doesn't involve us swimming through shit, please?”

My smirk dropped, and I put on as serious a face as I could muster.

“Honey, if you’d like to wait here like sitting ducks until those pred-hating  _ assholes  _ come and murder us, or do you wanna suffer a bad smell for a little bit?”

“I-...Bu-...Ugggggh,” she sighed. “You make things so hard for me, you know that, Wilde?”

I shrugged, letting my lips creep back into a smile again.

“Who better than me?”

“Anyone. Literally anyone.”

“Oh come on, you don’t mean that.”

“But I do.”

“You know you love me.”

“Shut up.”

Laughter escaped  my throat, filling the previously dead air with life. Within a few seconds of my chuckling, Honey joined in on the fun, letting the walls echo with the laughter of two doomed beings.

It was good to make her laugh again, to be completely honest. It had been too long since I’d seen her laugh. I didn’t remember if it had just been the day before, or a whole week ago, but the stimulation of Honey’s laughter filled me with a foreign feeling; something I hadn’t experienced in a long time. 

Once our mirth  had died down, we started to coordinate our plan.

There was a sewage entrance just outside Honey’s apartment complex. We decided to head there first thing in the morning to guarantee there were a limited amount of mammals outside. From there, we’d make the arduous trek through the muck to Savannah Central, where I’d have to think up a surefire plan to get Judy’s attention. 

Not too complicated on paper (my plans never were), but I had a sickening feeling that things were going to get much more difficult as we continued (just as my plans always seemed to get).

The thought of having to face Judy again after all this time filled me with a confusing feeling. A feeling I couldn’t quite put my finger on. A feeling I couldn’t even describe in words; that I couldn’t pronounce; that I could barely even pinpoint in my state of consciousness. With her knowing who I am, that I’m still alive… it would completely change everything about our encounter.

_ Am I being too optimistic about this? Would she truly turn against me, just like that? Just because I’m a predator? She did it before, but that was only to an extent. If she doesn’t help Honey and me...she’d be killing us. _

My mother’s voice came flooding into my head, obliterating any doubts I had in my plan. 

_ “...the world isn’t going to show us justice, Nicky. At least it won’t right now…”  _

My mom was right. She was always right. But there’s no point in her being right if I’m not there to prove her right.

She died in an unjust world, but I sure as hell wasn’t going to die in the same one without a fight. It’s either I face Judy now, or I die along with my mother’s words.

Now was the time I found justice. I could sense it. 

_ She  _ has  _ to help...she  _ has  _ to. She… _

I identified the feeling. The one when I thought of Judy. It crept up behind me and struck without me even noticing it.

It was remorse. It was remorse for abandoning her in her time of need, just as I had Ella Wilde.

* * *

 

Six o'clock in the morning came by far too slowly.

I attempted to sleep for at least a few hours before we headed out, but the Sandman simply refused to come to me. I think that Honey might have lulled off for a little bit, but she still looked tired as all hell when we were about to leave. 

Made me wonder how  _ I  _ was looking.

I went and looked into a mirror by the front door of the apartment. Part of the top-left corner was cracked due to the violent nature of the intruders from earlier. 

I barely recognized the mammal in the mirror. The fur on my muzzle was wild, sticking out every direction imaginable. Parts of my face looked matted, sticky even. I reached up to feel a clump of fur that was stuck together, only to find that the several strands had only gripped onto each other because of the stress I was currently feeling. I leaned closer, lowering my head so my snout didn’t hit the front of the glass, and pulled down my right eyelid. Red veins highlighted the entirety of my eye, the bloodshot sight making me look particularly disheveled. 

I heard a yawn from behind me, and a groggy voice spoke up.

“Let’s get this over with.”

My ears twitched as I shifted slightly to get a good look at the equally-tired Honey through the mirror. I let go of my eyelid.

“Yeah,” I sighed. “Let’s…”

I reached for the door, and held it open for Honey. She stepped out , and I followed close behind her, pausing slightly to look back behind me.

I had an unnerving feeling that it would be the last time I was in her apartment.

Leaving the apartment, I noticed that the heat had finally died down completely. It was pleasantly warm – cool, even. The sun was already out though, so the weather couldn’t get much warmer. 

The manhole cover was just about a dozen meters from the entrance to the complex, lying in the middle of the road. It beckoned to me like the entrance to another dimension.

Honey looked at me after careful inspection of the sewer entrance.

“...so...have you done this before?” she questioned.

I glanced at her and back to the manhole, slipping my hands into my pockets.

“Sadly, yes. I was a dumb kit when it came to making money,” I responded wryly. “Heh, had to hide from the cops somewhere.” I gave Honey a sly smile. 

Honey rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Well, ladies first.”

“Actually I’m gonna need you to help me out with this one, Honey.”

“Excuse me?” she asked in disbelief.

Rubbed the back of my neck. “Uh, yeah, these sewer covers weigh like, 250 pounds. I may  _ look  _ buff, but trust me, I’m not that strong.”

Honey rolled her eyes and sighed. “I hate you so fucking much right now. I hope you know that.”

“I’m counting on it.”

I made my way over to the cover, checking my surroundings for any bystanders before squatting down to get my fingers in between the ridges. ‘STORMDRAIN’ was marked on the front, with multiple bumps around the title resembling what looked braille around it. I ran my fingers across the tiny humps on the metal surface before digging my claws firmly into the side, ready to pull off the lid in a moments notice.

My eyes shot up to Honey, still standing in the same position as I left her.

“I wasn’t joking, Honey. This thing’s over twice my weight.”

The badger pinched the bridge of her nose, shaking her head in disapproval, before finally giving up and joining me in my efforts. She bent over, mimicking the way my paws were gripping the sides of the lid.

“On three,” I guided her. “Ready?”

She gave me a hesitant nod.

“Alright. 1...2...3... _ lift!” _

I could feel the veins in my neck bulge as I struggled to lift the immensely heavy object. The lid teetered upwards on Honey’s side first, giving me the grounds to get my part in the air as well. Once we had lifted the manhole cover a decent amount, we shuffled to the left. I dropped my end first, making a loud  _ clang  _ echo throughout the neighborhood. Honey looked up at me disapprovingly, narrowing her eyebrows, before dropping it in a similar fashion.

I shook my arms out, giving them a stretch from the foreign use of muscle.

I exhaled in relief. “Damn, Honey. You got your side up fast. Those push ups must be paying off, huh?”

“Oh yeah,  _ totally. _ Push ups really work my legs out  _ super well. _ ” she responded mockingly.

“Do I detect a hint of sarcasm, Ms. Badger? Shouldn’t skip leg day ...”

“Shut up and get in the hole, Wilde.”

I couldn’t help but let out a snicker.

“ _Shut up!”_ she demanded, annoyance showing in her voice. “Fucking hell, everything just _has_ to be a joke with you.”

“You just make it  _ so easy,  _ though.”

Honey shoved me towards the sewer entrance, crossing her arms when I turned around to retaliate. I held up my paws in defense.

“Okay, okay. I’m going,” I complied.

I squatted down again and lowered my legs to steady myself on a ladder rung. Without a moment’s hesitation, I started descending, the putrid smell of waste not even giving me a moment to prepare myself. The disgusting scent wafted up into my nostrils, nearly making me gag. I coughed to try and avoid tears from coming to my eyes.

“See, Honey? Just like going into your bunker,” I joked around a gagging cough.

“For some reason I highly doubt that, Nick.”

“Just trying to lighten the mood is all,” I said, resuming my plunge into the gutter.

My limbs went one after the other, rung after rung, until eventually my foot hit solid (and slightly damp) pavement at the bottom. I looked up, the morning light filtering in through the hole up above. 

“You coming, Honey?” I yelled.

“Yeah, yeah,” I made out distantly.

“Alright. Be sure to pull the manhole lid back over the hole once you climb in. We don’t wanna raise any suspicion.”

The light flickered away as the form of a badger’s legs shielded it from view.

“Oh no. I thought I’d just leave it out in the open,” she commented dry-wittedly as she reached over for the lid. “Maybe put out a sign: ‘We went down here!’ Gotta give the Purifiers a fighting chance to murder us.”

A scratchy noise reached my ears as the cover dragged over the cracked city street. I heard a  _ clang, _ signifying Honey was successful in her efforts.

The light was cut off from the area, forcing my eyes to adjust to the darkness. I moved slightly from the entrance to the sewer to give Honey space for her descent. When she reached the bottom, I wrapped my paw around her arm, earning me a slight flinch and startled squeak.

“Wow, Honey. What was  _ that?”  _ I asked, trying to contain my laughter.

She ripped her arm away from my grip. “You scared me you asshole! You know I don’t have as good of night vision as you! At least give me a fucking warning!”

I smirked. “Alright, alright, I’m sorry,” I apologized.

Honey’s nose scrunched up, the disgusting smell of our environment finally reaching her perception. She immediately hunched over and started to gag.

I moved over to her side, patting her back.

“Now now, Honey. We haven’t even gotten to the stinkiest part of the pit yet. The core of the apple, the eye of the hurricane, the-”

“Nick, I swear I’m going to hit you so hard you won’t be able to smell at all, _ ” _ Honey growled.

I moved back slightly.

“Point taken. Loud and clear, Ms. Badger.”

“Get back over here, you idiot,” she demanded. “My eyes haven’t adjusted to the dark yet.”

“Oh, right,” I said.

I took a few steps back over to her, resting my paw on her shoulder to make her aware of where I was. 

Honey’s cheeks were puffed out, and she was still bending over. One paw was clutched to her stomach, the other leaning on the grimy sewer wall.

“You gonna be okay, Honey?” I asked cautiously.

She sent a spitball hurling from her mouth to the floor, and slowly stood up, turning around to look me in the eyes.

“No, but I’ve made it this far, so I might as well keep it up.” Her weak voice practically oozed uncertainty from her tongue.

I raised up my paw and started scratching the back of my neck, suddenly taking special interest in the wall behind Honey.

“I mean...I hate to rain on your parade and all, Honey, but we have like six or seven miles to walk.”

She sighed. “Ever heard of ‘looking on the bright side of things’, asshole?”

My ears drooped, my eyes lowering to my feet. “Right, sorry.”

Honey’s menacing gaze softened, her paw suddenly finding mine and squeezing it affectionately. Sighing again, she addressed me.

“Look, Nick, I’m sorry. I bet you can understand how immensely fucking stressful this shit has been to deal with.”

I pursed my lips. “I- just...this is my fault Honey. I dragged you into this, and now you’re suffering time and time again because of my screw-ups. I-...I’m really sor-”

A finger pressed itself against my mouth mid-sentence, cutting me off.

“Nick, that means nothing to me.”

“...w-what?”

“Saying sorry. The pure fact that you care enough about me to get me  _ out  _ of this mess is much more appreciated than the opposing fact that you’re the one that brought me  _ into  _ this mess.”

“Bu-”

“ _ Shush!”  _ she interrupted. “Zip it! I don’t want to fucking hear it! You can prostrate yourself before me when we’re not standing next to a river of shit. Let’s just go, please.”

After staring at her a few seconds, my eyelids drooped and I shot my signature smirk.

“You’re the best, Hun.”

She clenched her fists aggressively at the name.

“...ney. Honey. I said Honey.”

“That’s what I thought. Now lead the way, Wilde.”

“At your service, madam,” I answered sarcastically. “Your eyes adjusted yet?”

She cocked her head back forth. “Eh, more or less.”

“Alrighty then. In that case, take my paw and I’ll lead you down the sewer of whimsical wonders.”

“The pit of shit suddenly turned into the ‘sewer of whimsical wonders’?” she questioned as I took her paw and started guiding her down the correct path.

“Just looking on the bright side, as you so wisely stated earlier.”

“Touché, fox. Touché.”

We made our way down the darkly lit tunnel, taking turns at intersections every once in awhile. Honey was skeptical of my ability to know for sure where we were supposed to go, but I kept repeating over and over again that I’m certain of my navigation skills. Hopefully I sounded confident.

Echoes of our footsteps carried out through the entirety of the area, the geometry of our environment being the perfect reinforcement for sound. The careful  _ plip plap  _ of our pawpads on the ground shot into my ears like the squirt of a water gun. 

My mind kept turning back to what exactly I would say to Judy when... _ if  _ I managed to get ahold of her. It would be probably hard;she was made to believe I was dead for the past three years. But considering our time constraints it would be an obstacle I’d have to overcome quickly. Assuming she was willing to lend a paw, there still left a few questions that I was left struggling to answer. Where would she take us? What if she just turns us in then and there? What will she think of Honey, a complete stranger, in the middle of all the confusion?

_...does she truly hate the fact that I’m a predator? _

The thought hurt just as much as a it had years prior, when she accused an entire class of species of reverting back to their savage ways. It hurt so fucking bad.

This one mammal, the first since my mother that I’d truly thought believed in me, completely betrayed my trust, absolutely demolishing any feelings of self-confidence I had gained since she hustled me into working with her. It made me want to-

_ No. This line of thought wasn’t helping. _

I suddenly stopped guiding Honey, dropping my head into my paws. A sliver of light hailed in from a storm drain up above.

“You alright, Nick?” I heard her say.

_ You have to let this go. You have to let this go. You have to let this go. She’s all you have left to rely on. You trusted her once. _

“Nick? Oh fuck...”

I raised my head out of my paws, seeing Honey looking down in terror at a crippled, immobile figure. The conflicting, repeating thoughts fled my mind. She kneeled over, placing two fingers at what appeared to be a…

...neck.

The body of a dead tiger lay at my feet, looking drained of life and cold to the touch. I heard the badger gasp and quickly pull her paw away. I couldn’t help but think of the tiger I was running with while being chased by the Purifiers the day I got shot.

“He’s dead,” she let out in a defeated, monotone voice. “By the looks of it for no more than a couple days.”

She slowly stood up, wiping away some dried blood on the right leg of her pants.

I moved my eyes across the lifeless being. He was lying down on his chest, naked, head turned to the side. His eyes were open in terror, and his mouth was left agape, as if in the midst of screaming in pain. His throat was slit wide open. His left arm was twisted in a funny way, like someone carelessly tossed him down here, mangling his limbs in the process.

The daylight shone in, bouncing off a smaller portions of the tiger’s back, seemingly illuminating what appeared to be...skin?

I moved closer to get a better look, and sure enough, the fur on part of his back was shaved off. I could make out dried blood staining his body. He was definitely cut with a bladed object. Between the dried spots of blood were several more highlighted lines where he’d been cut. In crude lettering, it spelled something out.

**“Sic semper, carnivores.”**

My eyes widened. I suddenly grabbed Honey’s arm, leading her around the dead predator, and away from the graphic and haunting scene.

Any pretense of levity evaporated, and not a word was said for the rest of our journey.

…

“We’re here,” I muttered to Honey emotionlessly. 

The two of us were still quite shaken up by the grisly image of that brutally murdered tiger. He was so haphazardly thrown into the darkness of the sewer, it was disturbing to even think any mammal in Zootopia would be sick enough to do something. No matter how much you hate someone else, nobody deserves that.

Honey nodded her head, now aware of our arrival, and cautiously peered up the ladder that led into Savannah Central.

“How are we supposed to get out there without anybody noticing. We’ll literally be crawling out of the fucking gutter,” she asked.

I puffed out my cheeks and slowly blew out some air, my paws driving up to my hips.

“No surefire way, but it  _ is  _ Sunday. Sunday morning to be exact,” I explained. “I doubt city life is exactly booming at the moment, and this isn’t a super active area in Savannah Central. Our best bet really is to just wait until there’s as little activity as possible up above, pry off the manhole, and make a mad dash for the nearest alley.”

“And if someone sees us?”

My ears drooped. “Just act like you’re supposed to be crawling out of a gutter, and hope it doesn’t come to that.”

Honey gave me another silent nod before slapping a paw on my shoulder.

“After you, comrade. I assume along with smell, you have the better hearing out of the two of us?”

“Better hearing, smell, vision, superior wit … what about me  _ isn’t _ better than you, Honey?”

The badger stroked her chin. “Hmmm let me think. Judgement, sense of humor, physical appearance,” she held up a finger with every reason she gave.

“I can agree with all of those except the last one.”  
You’re just too stubborn to face the hard truth, Wilde,” Honey chuckled.

“I could say the same to you,” I replied, smirking back.

Without another word, I swung up the ladder with Honey (quite literally) right at my tail. When I reached the top I perked up an ear, raising it as close to the sewer entrance as possible to get a good idea of whom might be on the other side.

Suddenly remembering the insane weight of the manhole cover earlier, I looked down at Honey and motioned for her to come up.

“What?” she muttered, squinting up at me.

“I’m gonna need your help lifting this thing.”

The badger opened her mouth to protest, most likely not wanting to squeeze so close to me in close quarters, but closed it realizing it was what she needed to do. She climbed the rest of the way up the ladder, the narrow hole leaving little room for either of us when side by side.

She exhaled shakily, probably claustrophobic from the several hour long trek through the sewer.

“Alright Honey,” I addressed her. “I’m going to listen for a gap  where we can get through without as little attention drawn to us as possible. I’m going to give you a count to three, and we’re going to hoist up the manhole cover. Once the lid’s out of the way, you place it back on while I scope out the best place to hide. We’re going to have to go as fast as we can to get out of public sight, okay?”

“Got it,” she confirmed.

“Good. Now, we have to wait a little bit. There are definitely some mammals out and about at the moment.”

We stood uncomfortably on the top rungs of the ladder for a solid ten minutes, biding our time for the perfect moment to make a break for it. I could hear the bustling of taxis and the small talk of Zootopians as they made their way by on the hot, Sunday morning. I could make out two voices approaching our direction, but farther off to the right; on a sidewalk, perhaps. The sound of their footsteps accompanied their talking, occasionally interrupted by the slurping of some sort of beverage. The voices distanced themselves away from us, and finally, it was quiet.

I tapped Honey on the shoulder, giving her a quick thumbs up. She gave a slight nod in response.

“Three, two,  _ one _ ,” I whispered.

Our paws shot up, using every ounce of shoulder strength to get the manhole cover up and out of the way. A few seconds of straining, and the barrier wiggled and toppled over, leaving us clear for our mad dash. 

I immediately took charge; once I was on my feet I inspected the surrounding area for an alley, or anything that would give us some cover from the outside world. My eyes locked on a passage between two restaurants, conveniently equipped with multiple garbage bins to conceal ourselves. I heard a heavy  _ clang  _ of the cover being shoved back into position, so I hurriedly slapped Honey’s arm and sprinted over to the alleyway without even checking if she was following along.

I dove behind last dumpster in the row, scurrying up to sit on my behind. Honey arrived in the same position shortly after, leaving us to catch our breath together.

“Did...did anyone see us?” she gasped in between wheezes.

“I...don’t...think so,” I replied in a similar fashion.

“Phew,” she said relieved, wiping her brow. She slowly stood up and carefully peeked her eyes over the top of the dumpster. “Shit…”

“What, what is it?” I questioned the badger tensely.

“The fucking manhole cover isn’t all the way back on.”

Now it was my turn to curse.  
“Shit…” I murmured under my breath.

I got to my feet beside Honey, looking at the sewer entrance we had just escaped from less than a minute ago. Sure enough, one side of the cover was partially still tipped onto the street.

“What the fuck do we do, Nick?” she asked in distress. Her paws visibly tightened on the dumpster she was clinging onto, as if she were holding on for dear life.

“Uhhh…”

_ What  _ do  _ we do?  _

All of a sudden a lightbulb flashed in my mind.

“Oh I could kiss you Honey! You’re a genius.” I said gleefully, punching the badger in the arm playfully.

“I know, but if you kiss me I’ll rip your face off. ” Honey said brusquely. “Care to explain why I’m such a genius?”

“Tell me Honey, what do you think a police officer would do if they stumbled upon a piece of public property that’s been clearly tampered with?”

The badger stood a moment in thought be she turned to me, a smile of realization etched upon her face.

“Stop and fix it!” she yelled excitedly, too happy to contain her vocal dynamic.

“Bingo,” I confirmed, pointing a finger at her. “But seriously Honey, use your inside voice.”

Her smile dropped when she noticed how loud she’d spoken. “Right, sorry.” She ducked back down behind dumpster, me following suit. “So is one of us just going to keep watch? I mean, it probably won’t be that long before Hopps pulls u-”

Her voice was halted when the screeching of brakes was heard in the streets. Honey leaned to the side to get a look from outside of the alley. Her eyes widened.

“What is it?” I put my paws on top of the dumpster and pulled myself up the same position as earlier to find the reason behind the surprised look on Honey’s face.

“Well I’ll be damned. Judy-fucking-Hopps. Hallelujah.”

A police van much too large for the slight bunny was in clear view in front of us. I immediately recognized it as the same one that I rode in after I was beaten half to death by those pred-haters after I’d received my collar. I could see Judy talking on her radio in the car, glancing down through the driver side window to get a better look at the dismantled sewer cover. 

“How are you going to get her attention?” Honey whispered to me.

“Uh…”

That was a good question. I checked my surroundings for anything that might make enough noise to send her over here. My hand wrapped around the first thing it felt, and without thinking, I threw it right into the car.

The glass beer bottle shattered, leaving multiple scratches on the side of the ZPD vehicle. Judy jumped in her seat, her right ear shooting up into the air. She turned to my direction, nose twitching. I quickly ducked down behind the dumpster, for some reason suddenly afraid. I knew that I needed to speak to her, but I could barely get myself to look her in the eye. 

The bottle was more than enough to get her attention.

I heard the car door open and shut, the rabbit slowly approaching our hiding spot.

“Dispatch, we have a 23110, possibly a homeless mammal in an alleyway. Officer Hopps investigating,” she boldly said into her walkie-talkie. 

“ _ 10-4 Officer Hopps. What’s your 10-20?”  _ a voice replied. The words were slightly distorted by the sounds of the radio frequencies.

“Savannah Central, Prairie avenue, right next to the Snarlbucks. 10-23.”

“ _ Copy that. _ ” The walkie-talkie clicked off.

Honey gripped my shoulder as Judy meticulously stepped closer to us. She reached the alleyway, her feet crushing dry leaves and wrappers of various food items. Each sound was like a needle into my ear canal.

She veered around the corner, quickly stepping back when her eyes met mine.

“Uh, hey Carrots! , It’s me, Ni-”

Her hand shot down to grab her fox repellent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Police codes:  
> 23110 - Person (mammal in this case) throwing objects at vehicles  
> 10-4 - Message received, understood  
> 10-20 - Location  
> 10-23 - Stand by


	13. Incarceration for Species

Nothing could compare to the anguish I was feeling.

_This is it. I decide to trust her, to give her one more fucking chance, and I'm done. Well done, Nick you hopeless sap. Well done._

Everything around me seemed to move in slow motion. I heard Honey stifle a small gasp when she noticed the painful spray Judy's paw was hovering over. My senses were honed to a point; I was hyper-aware of everything around me. I could almost see the scent particles of the trash around us, I could nearly taste the sunlight that engulfed the rabbit's looming figure.

I really had thought she would help us. I truly, truly did. Clearly I was wrong. I just couldn't believe somebody so passionate about overcoming obstacles was going around putting other mammals down.

"Nick," she finally stated coldly, "if you even  _are_ Nick, I'm going to have to ask you to place your paws behind your head." She turned her head to Honey. "You too, ma'am." Honey's ears twitched at the specific referral.

The slow motion facade dropped, and I carefully complied to Judy's demands, raising my paws behind my skull. I couldn't help but feel exposed...helpless. It was just so…

_BZZRT_

The violent travelling of electric wasn't enough to knock me out, but it was enough to bring me to my senses.

Judy was going to bring me to jail. If I go against any of her commands, I'll be met with a mouthful of fox repellant, something I wasn't willing to risk.

I looked up at Judy's beckoning purple eyes. She looked back at me for a second, seeming almost concerned for me, but she quickly shook away any trace of sympathy and pulled two shiny pairs of pawcuffs from her belt. Sadly, my shady past had me used to this process. I turned around, exposing my wrists for Judy to lock up, leaving me a mere insect in this city ruled by prey. I felt the temperature of the cool metal through the barrier of my fur, harsh against my skin.

Honey followed my pitiful example. She turned and went through the same process, ending with the two of us ready to be taken into custody.

I brought one knee out from under me to stand up, my legs representing a kneeling position, but a paw gripped my arm, signaling me to stay put. I heard the pitter patter of Judy's feet move back to her vehicle, the opening and closing of a door, and the same footsteps coming back to me. I peeked over my shoulder, checking what Judy could possibly be doing behind me.

_You're joking. You've got to be kidding me, Hopps._

She was carrying a pair of muzzles.

After opening up to her about my troubling experience with some bullies as a kit, she of all mammals knew the difficulties I've faced with this God-forsaken restraint. But she didn't care.

She never cared.

It was all to get me closer to her. She knew she needed my wit for her investigation;, that she could never do it without me. Using me to reach her petty childhood dream was cold-hearted and cruel.

Before I knew it, I could feel the oral prison wrap itself around my head, bringing back not only memories of that fateful day with the Junior Ranger Scouts, but also when Randy the hare brought me in for my shock collar.

As predicted, Honey didn't escape the wrath of the muzzle, and shared the same fate as me.

Forced to stand up and follow the bunny, we made our way over to her police van. I paused to look at in awe but also confusion of the sheer size of it. I must've been too busy paying attention to my facial injuries last time I was a passenger in this vehicle to realize how humongous it was. Hell, that thing was  _way_ too big for me! How in the world could anyone expect a rabbit to be able to drive this?

Judy hopped ahead of us, gaining enough vertical velocity to grab the handle of the back door, swinging it open.

"Get in," she said bluntly.

I stood there, unwilling to believe my fate was already sealed. I wasn't going down without a struggle.

'Carrots…" I gulped. "Judy...please."

Her ears shot up, and she slightly turned her head to look at me over her shoulder.

"We need help, Judy," I continued. "We need help big time. If you ever really were my friend … if there's any shred of that left in your heart, you'll listen to me here and now. My life, and Honey's as well," I motioned to the badger next to me, "are at risk. Please, Judy. Please help."

It was difficult to make any paw gestures with my paws tied behind my back. In fact, if was hard enough to speak with my snout cooped up in a tiny little cage.

Judy turned her head back to its original position. "Get in the car before I'm forced into doing something drastic, Nick."

My paws clenched into fists. "...no."

The bunny turned around, a baffled look on her face. "Ex-excuse me?"

"No, Judy. You're going to listen to me, because if you don't this could very well be the last fucking time you ever even  _speak_ to me. Now are you gonna take those huge ears of yours and put 'em to use, or are you gonna leave me in the dust just like when you completely  _fucked_ me and every other predator back at the press conference three years ago?" I took a deep breath, that last sentence along with my extreme rage at Judy's actions completely winding me.

She unclicked a button on her utility belt and pulled out a small can of fox repellent.

"If you don't get in the vehicle, I will be forced to take disciplinary actions."

She raised the cannister to my face, and I stared at the small hole that in a moment's notice could spray liquid hell into my eyes.

My fists uncurled. I slowly trudged past the rabbit, head down and a scowl etched across my muzzle. I climbed up into the van, scooting over to the left side to allow Honey to sit up next to me.

Judy shut the door behind us, and I heard a clicking noise, signifying the lock had been activated. Hopps stood outside of the vehicle for a minute, doing… something. She eventually hopped up into the driver's seat. The engine started and we were off to what I could only assume was the Zootopia Police Department.

As I felt out the rhythm of the wheels dragging across the concrete, I realized something… something odd.

I was never read my Miranda Rights.

The Hopps I knew wouldn't have made that mistake.

* * *

"What's the story, Hopps?"

A gruff voice penetrated through the police car window, making my ears twitch when it hit my eardrums. I looked through the glass barrier to my left to see a large, muscular cape buffalo, towering over the comically small (in comparison) Judy.

"Two preds outside of Happytown without any form of permit, identification, or guardian. I took them in without any sort of struggle, Chief," she replied valiantly.

"Just what I like to hear from my best officer. Take these chompers in, I got some work to do."

"Yes sir, Chief Bogo."

As far as I could remember, the only time I saw Chief Buffalo-Butt interact with Judy was after the Mr. Manchas attack. Long story short, it wasn't positive. I had to use my cunning to save that poor rabbit's fur, but the Chief didn't seem to be changing his mind. Now he was all over her, practically showering the girl in praise.

_Did the exposure from the Night Howler case really give a fucking bunny that much traction in the workplace? Hell, she was just called the "best officer" on the force. Now that's high praise._

Some movement outside caught my eye, and I saw Judy come out of the station with a hippopotamus. Judy started towards my side of the vehicle.

I jumped at the sound of a small yelp coming from the badger behind me. I turned to see her neck arched down in pain, her paws trying desperately to escape their chain prisons and soothe her burns.

"Honey," I said quietly.

She'll looked up at me with wide, glossy eyes. She was afraid.

"Don't tell them anything, and…" I gulped. "And if this is the end...I...I really appreciate you being there for me."

"Y-you too, Nick." Her voice broke halfway through the sentence….Or maybe it was just the noise made from the door opening.

A grey figure hopped up to my side. Two small paws grabbed me by the arm, yanking me down to the ground. I just nearly landed on my feet, but to my dismay, slipped at the last second, falling flat on my face.

_At least I didn't break my nose again._

The other officer pulled Honey out of the car as well, much more forcefully than what I suffered. I carefully balanced myself on my feet, unused to standing up without the use of my paws to steady myself. She hit the ground with a loud thud, making me reflexively flinch. I felt a tug at my arm again and a shiver shot up my spine as a followed Judy Hopps into the police station.

…

Two cold chains led from my wrists to the steel table in front of me. The muzzle was still clasped onto my face, bringing back painful memories and reinforcing their negativity. The chair I was sitting in was much too hard for any shred of comfort, and my ass was starting to get sore. I sat on the edge of it as the seating space was meant to accompany a mammal of any size. It was ten sizes too big for me, but I managed. Not that I had an option.

The room was freezing, probably to better suit any police officers in their multi-layered uniform. I felt a small stinging on my foot, and looked down to see a small ant nibbling on the flesh. I quickly brought my other foot up and brushed it away as forcefully as I could, with intention to kill. Surprisingly, after the ant landed on the floor, it continued to crawl away as if nothing had happened. Great, even the bugs were after me ...

My heart skipped a beat when the door to my left suddenly opened, revealing the not-so intimidating form of Judy Hopps. She was holding a clipboard and her staple carrot pen, tapping it thoughtfully against her chin. Without looking up, she slowly walked into the room, letting the door swing shut with a loud bang. This earned another jump on my part, but Judy was unfazed, too concentrated to notice.

She pulled the pen away from her chin to quickly scribble something down. The pen scratching against paper gave me a satisfying sort of feeling that juxtaposed the entirety of the situation.

I looked down at my paws, the pads nearly going numb from how cold the surface of the table was. I clenched them into fists, desperate to escape the discomfort.

_How did I get here?_

I quietly exhaled, completely devoid of hope.

_I mean, I know I'm not a good mammal, but did I really deserve something like… this? I expected to be arrested for my cons, some tiny little slip up in a plan some day, not incarceration for my species. This is just plain bullshi-_

Something was hugging me. Wait, no.  _Someone_ was hugging me. I turned my gaze to whomever was grasping onto my shirt for dear life to see none other that the bunny had caused this entire situation.

She was audibly crying —no, sobbing— the tears soaking into the fabric I was wearing in a way that reminded me of how my mother had done so many years ago.

"Oh Nick," she stammered. "Oh Nick, I thought you were dead!" Her voice was muffled, her mouth being buried into the crook of my armpit. I'm sure I smelled like pure shit considering the conditions I was just recently in, but she didn't seem to care.

I couldn't do anything but sit there in shock. Even if I wanted to, I couldn't comfort her with my paws being chained to the table, so what resulted was an awkward, one-sided embrace.

She sniffled a few times and pulled away, although it looked like that was the last thing she wanted to do. Her paws raised up to wipe away any remaining tears, and she pulled them down to look at what I assume was an expression of confusion from me.

"You have absolutely  _no_ idea how worried I was," Judy finally got out. She shoved out her arms whenever she put any sort of emphasis on a word. "I looked high and low, there was no record of you  _anywhere,_ even in Happytown. I heard you got shot in the  _head_ and I thought that was it! Are you okay?"

I rolled my eyes and slouched as far as I could with the pawcuffs still attached to me.

"Carrots, I-"

"Nick, I know you'll never forgive me…" her eyes dropped to the excessively large seat she was standing on, and her ears drooped. "And I don't blame you...I wouldn't forgive me either."

My ears twitched at that. I rose an eyebrow, turning my attention to the bunny.

"I was ignorant...and irresponsible...and small-minded." She brought her paws together, twiddling her thumbs, probably afraid to look me in the eye. "The predators shouldn't suffer because of my mistakes. I have to fix this...but I can't do it without you. And after we're done," her voice broke, her tears were visibly collecting into a pool on the chair at this point. "You can hate me, a-and that'll be fine, because I was a  _horrible_ friend, and I hurt you, a-and y-you...and you can walking away knowing that you were right  _all along._ I really am just a dumb bunny."

Either it was a really successful attempt for pity, or this "dumb bunny" was legitimately pouring her heart out to me. She was standing right in front of me, completely defenseless, bawling her eyes out, and I was here, trying to determine whether or not she was being sincere.

A thought popped into my head, one that cleared my clouded judgement and filled me with a warm, protected feeling.

"Judy?" I asked the still sobbing rabbit. She wiped away one last tear and looked up at me, the first time we had looked each other in the eye with the intent of a real, mammal connection in a long time.

"My mother…" I continued, "My mother told me that mammals don't particularly like different things. Mammals find different things scary. And when mammals get scared, they can do some stupid, hurtful things." I turned my body, raising my knees up to my body and pulling the chains to my cuffs as far as they could possibly go. The friction caused by them put strain on my wrists. I managed to speak as audibly as I could with the muzzle trapping my mouth.

"I can forgive you for what happened at the press conference. Everything after that though… I don't know. Judy, I've seen some stuff. Probably to an extent that you don't even understand. I just—" I sighed. "I just don't know what you expect me to say. You're telling every prey in the city that they have the power to stand up to the 'big bad preds'. For God's sake, you even still have your fox repellant. Do you really think I can forgive you for that?"

I didn't think it was possible for her ears to sink even lower. She opened her mouth, and made a small squeak, and quickly closed it again.

"Judy?"

She looked back at me.

"Are you  _still_ afraid of me?"

Her ears rose, her posture changed, and a look of determination spread across her face. "Am I afraid of you? No I am not."

I couldn't help but smirk at that as much as my mind told me to keep its position on hating her. She sure knew how to speak.

"Then I need you to prove it. Prove to me that you really aren't scared of me, or any predators for that matter. Prove to me that what you're doing is all just a big misunderstanding and I have  _no_ reason to harbor  _any_ sort of grudge against you. When you can do that successfully, then  _maybe_ ," I brought up both of my paws, pointer fingers raised. " _lots_ of emphasis on the 'maybe', we will talk about potentially fixing this. Extra points if you ditch the fox repellant. Double bonus points if you take this muzzle off." I shook my paw to send her off. "Now, hop along and bring me to my cold, dank cell where I will inevitably rot for the remainder of my worthless, pred life."

A small smile crept upon her face for a second before it was wiped away from the pessimism of my comment. She gave a quick nod of her head before leaning over and detaching my pawcuffs from the table.

I was led out of the room and into the corridor. We took a few turns, but I wasn't paying attention to where we were going. I didn't care. Too much was going on in my mind to pay any sort of attention to my surroundings.

We finally reach the cell, and without any order to, I walked in and sat on the lumpy cot. Judy came in and without hesitation, removed my pawcuffs and muzzle. Not once did her paw even make the slightest motion towards the fox repellant. She went to the doorway of the cell and place a paw on it. It slid shut, the bottom of the door sliding against the concrete ground and making uncomfortably loud clanging noises. She stood outside for a second, staring at me as if she wanted to saying something.

No words came out.

She walked away and I was left in solitude, the buzzing of the dim light bulbs near my cell starting to lull me to sleep. And before exhaustion overcame me, I thought of Judy.

She was still the rabbit I knew.


	14. Then as it was, then again it will be

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ll be the one to break the ice. This is long overdue. Over two months in fact. And I doubt that the length of the chapter is very rewarding for the wait either…  
> Anyways, I have been dealing with quite a great deal of personal problems and commitments, and I appreciate there not being too many people asking, “WHERE IS THE NEW CHAPTER, ASSHOLE?” Seriously, it’s been a rough time, motivation has been at an all time low and I honestly have no idea where this story is going. Thanks for 100 followers though! At least some people think this story is good (unlike me :P).

The smell of wax crayons filled my nostrils; an overwhelming scent of washable markers, rubber cement, and construction paper complemented the smell. I waited at the back of a pack of mammals crowded around a desk in the middle of an arts and crafts room. The teacher sat idly by, her spectacles balancing cartoonishly on the bridge of her muzzle as she read the Zootopia city newspaper. _Catnip trafficking dominates drug empire and ZPD resources_ , the cover read.

I didn’t know what catnip was, but I could only assume if the police were involved it wasn’t anything good.

I brought my attention back to the table in the middle of the room to see a beaver collecting his crayons and walking over to a table. I approached the box of coloring utensils.

The only color left was black, two broken black crayons at that.

I sighed and collected what I got, grabbed a piece of paper (being careful not to puncture it with my claws) and scouted the room for a place to sit. There was a single chair near the corner of the room. The length of the table fit about six mammals whom were all chatting about their drawings contently, while the width of the table only housed one seat. I quietly made my way over, careful not to bump into anyone and bring unwanted attention to myself. I sat down just as quietly as I’d traveled there, and began to work.

The crayon scratched and wax pieces crumbled off to the side of the tip where it met the paper. I drew my share of squiggles and lines, forming the paper into a canvas, with me being the artist. When my wrist had gotten tired of shading things in, I looked up for a second. The squirrel sitting just a few feet away from must have seen my change in movement through her peripheral vision. She moved her eyes slowly down to the crayons on the right side of her, the side closer to me. Her finger graced each crayon as she counted all of them under her breath. When she looked up, she gave me a scowl and grabbed all of them in one paw and moved them to her other side.

She thought I stole a crayon from her.

I looked at where I had been drawing the past few minutes. Nope. I still only had the single black crayon. No more than a nub at this point.

I ducked under the table and darted my eyes about, searching for any of the squirrel’s crayons that may have been lost. As I had suspected I found one - a green crayon, only a few people ahead of where I sat, contrasted the white floor. I got out of my chair and crawled over to my destination, prudently weaving around the legs and tails that swung about under the table as the young mammals drew. I snatched the crayon in my paw and made my way back over to my chair.

Extending my arm over the squirrel, I offered her lost drawing utensil back.

“Here,” I said.

The girl looked down at the green crayon in my paw in surprise.

“Huh?” she replied, rather harshly.

“I found the crayon. It was under the table,” I explained.

The squirrel snorted, giving me a quick preview of her buck teeth. “I don’t take back stolen crayons. You can keep it, fox.”

My mouth hung slightly open; I was hurt by her choice of words. But no matter. Now I had a green crayon: exactly what I needed.

I brought my paw down to my paper and shaded in the finishing touches of what I had created. Suddenly, I heard the clanking of high heels coming towards me. Somebody was looming over my shoulder.

“And what did you make, Wilde?” the teacher asked annoyedly, like she had a gun to her head and was forced to speak to me.

I didn’t like how she called me by my last name. My mother said it was impolite without the use of “mister”.

I turned around, pulling my paper off the table in the process, and handed it to the arts and crafts instructor. It represented a crudely drawn kit fox wearing a green uniform of some sort.

“I drew myself as a Junior Ranger Scout!” I said excitedly. I heard a few poorly hidden giggles from those who had heard me.

Her pupils went up and down as they glossed over the paper.

“This...is you?” the teacher asked for clarification.

“Yep!” I kept my optimistic tone up as the giggles from my fellow classmates turn into fully-fledged laughter. Looking up, hoping for some kind of validation.

I never forgot the sound of the teacher’s laughs as she joined in the hysteria.


	15. Utopia of Fraudulence

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, soooooooooooo  
> I actually updated this months ago on fanfiction.net and forgot to update it here. . .  
> I'm so sorry! XD I hope it was worth the wait!

****_What the_ hell _do you think you’re doing, Wilde?_

“What am _I_ doing?” I wondered aloud, placing a paw on my chest in a defensive manner. “Why, I don’t know …  I’m lying in a prison cot, trying not to think about what is probably an inevitable execution for committing crimes against the prey population. How about you, brain? What’ve you been up to?”

I put my paws back behind my head and sighed, looking up at the grimy, cement ceiling above me. The cell reeked of feces, and being an evolved, civilized fox, I can’t stand it.

 _Cut the bull crap and take me seriously. I’m_ you _, and even I can’t make a joke about how bad this situation is._

“Fine, fine,” I gave in. “What do you want?”  
_What I wanna know is why you’re making me think about possibly forgiving that good-for-nothing rabbit. News flash, Wilde, she’s the reason you got shot in the head!_

“Um, last time I checked, that was a specist prey in a creepy mask. Try again, bud.”  
_You know what I mean. Don’t get sarcastic with me...erm...yourself._

Long, black insects crawled around on the ceiling. My eyes danced from creature to creature as I tried to summon up a response to myself.

“Listen, I’m fully aware of the wrongs she’s done, and I’m dead set on holding her accountable for them. I’m not forgiving her just yet.”

 _Just yet?_ Just yet?! _So you’re saying there’s a chance that sometime in the future you’ll be holding paws with that ball of fluff, singing Kumbaya?_

“I wouldn’t exactly put it that way, but yes, there is a possibility that she will be forgiven.”

_What changed, Nick?_

“I…”

What _did_ change? I was trying to get her help, sure, but I definitely never thought about forgiving her before now. Was it something she said? The way she acted? Did she break out a pocketwatch and hypnotize me?

_The rabbit’s hustling you._

My face turned to a look of disbelief. “Hustling _me_? Excuse you, pal, but nobody hustles Nick Wilde.”

_So I suppose her blackmailing you to work with the ZPD by threatening to send you to prison for felony tax evasion was just a joke, huh? All fun and games?_

“Well, y-yeah, no, but-”

 _Here’s the thing, Wilde. The cute little bunny shed some crocodile tears and effectively got you on her side. You’re smarter than this. You’re smarter than her. Don’t let her hustle_ _you._

I shut my eyes, playing back the memory of Judy sobbing before me.

“It seemed so _real_ though.”

_Yeah, well, so did your friendship with her, didn’t it? And look how that turned out. Hopps is a talented actress, I’ll admit. If only she’d been an actress instead of a hypocritical jackboot._

I sighed. “You’re right.”

 _Nope._ We’re _right._

A chuckle broke out from the back of my throat. “Heh, I crack myself up.”

The loud bang of a door at the end of the hallway jolted me away from my thoughts. I sat up in my cot, leaning on my arms behind me. Heavy, thunderous footsteps echoed down the concrete corridor , growing ever closer to my cell. A large rhinoceros walked in front of the bars I was staring at, and to my dismay, he stopped and looming over me. His eyes darted down to a clipboard he was holding and and then came back to me.

“Nicholas Wilde?” he said in a deep, bored voice. The way he talked reminded me of a con partner I once had. Lance Boldtooth. He was a leopard. Had a lisp. I hated him to death.

I raised a paw up in the air, as if I was eager to answer a question in a classroom. “Present.”

Unamused, he moved his hand in a ‘come here’ motion. I reluctantly swung my feet over to the floor and trudged over to the edge of the cell. I stood there for what seemed like an unreasonable amount of time as he studied my appearance, making markings on his clipboard as he did so.

Impatient with the process, I asked, “So what’s the weather like out there, Officer...sorry, bud, I didn’t get a name.”

“Fuck off,” he replied, pupils still glued to the sheet he was writing on.

“Yes, of course. Officer Fuck Off, what’s the weather like out there? I haven’t been getting my recommended dosage of Vitamin D lately, so I’d appreciate a little update on the world outside these walls.”

“Shut your trap right now or I’ll make sure you don’t get a last meal.” Again, said while he was looking at the clipboard.

That immediately put an end to my snide comments.

I stayed silent as the scribbling of pen to paper kept my senses in check. I watched curiously while the rhino paused to read each prompt, and then either made an exaggerated check mark or an ‘X’ on his evaluation sheet. He sighed, and turned his attention to me, clicking the pen and tucking it away in the shirt pocket of his uniform.

“I’m gonna need your belt and tie,” he instructed, as if he’d done so a million times before.

I blinked at him as the intent of the command suddenly came to my understanding. I blinked again, turning my attention to my tie.

“Uh, yeah,” I complied, working my paws to get it off my neck. “Why didn’t this just happen when I got here?”

“Hopps got  sloppy all of a sudden,” he said, reaching through the bars to grab my tie from me. “Didn’t search you.”

I furrowed my eyebrows. “Wait, Carro—Officer Hopps forgot to search me?”

“Yep. First time in her career she makes a mistake and it’s on some worthless fox trying to snoop through the city without an escort.” He grumbled and shook his head. “What a joke. She probably won’t even get punished, given her status.”

Finished with my tie, I started to unfasten my belt . “Yeah, but whaddaya think would happen if you prey didn’t have a celebrity figure keeping you hating predators? It’d be _such_ a shame if we were reentered back into society and treated like fellow mammals again, huh?”

The rhino gave me an intimidating glare. “Listen, fox, I’m not letting you savages back into my damn city collared or not. Dozens of innocent prey were left in the hospital because you can’t control your biology.”

“And _hundreds_ of predators were left in _body bags_ because of your specist hate groups! How is that a fair trade-off?”

“Don’t you go pinning those lunatic terrorist attacks on me! Just because I’m a prey, doesn’t mean I’m gonna lose my morals and try to kill every sharp-toothed mammal I see.”

“And just because I’m a predator, doesn’t mean I’m gonna maim every pr—.”

_BZZRT_

I found myself on the floor, blinking away the flashing lights of pain from the shock. . I looked up to see rhinoceros was smirking, and bent down down to reach through the bars and pick up my belt from where it fell from my paws. Without another word, he walked off the way he came.

I let out some violent sounding coughs, sending fire through my throat. Every time I swallowed, all I felt was sheer pain. These electric shocks were really starting to take a toll on me. It took several minutes of deep breaths to finally steady myself, and my mind turned to what the rhino had said.

Judy had forgotten to search me. Whether that was purposeful or not, she had never made such a careless and potentially dire mistake since she joined the police force, and it just so happened to be with me. Did she forget because she was in such shock from not seeing me after so long? Did she avoid searching me to try and build some sort of trust? I could have had a weapon, a bomb. I could have had the tools to break out of my cell, and set dozens of predators free. This wasn’t some minor slip-up. This was a big deal.

I reached a paw to hike up my pants, which - free of their belt- had started to slide down my waist.  I hopped up to sit on the cell cot and considered my options.

I was back to the drawing board. Assuming Judy really was trying to help me out, it was still going to take a miracle to get me out of this mess. As much as I bet that officer was simply trying to frighten me with that “last meal” comment, I wouldn’t have been surprised if there was some truth to it. If his recent experience was any judge, nobody would look twice if a predator got executed  for something as minor as going to the city by himself.

_Wait, no, I wasn’t by myself, I was with—_

Honey.

I sprung to my feet and went to the front of my cell, wrapping my paws around the bars. Nobody was in the cell across from me. I could only see the two cells to the left and right of the empty one, both occupied, but none with the badger I was looking for.

“Honey?” I called out. My ears raised as I tried to pick up a response.

“Sugar!” a masculine voice replied.

“Milk!” somebody else yelled.

“Eggs!”

“Vanilla extract!”

My face softened as disappointment washed over me. While the other mammals continued chuckling, I dropped my arms to my sides and turned back around as the mocking laughter of the other inmates faded.

“Nick?” A familiar voice suddenly asked from the other side of my cell wall, muffled, but echoing through a small set of bars near the ceiling.  “Nick? That you?”

That was definitely her!

“Yeah it’s me! Are you okay? Are you hurt?” I said, rushing to the wall and placing my head against it.

“I’m fine. You?”

“Only thing injured is my pride, but that’s nothing new.”

“Hah! Boy, I can always count on you for a pick-me-up.”

“What can I say? It’s what I do best.”

“No, what _you_ do best is get us stuck in deep shit like this. What’s the plan?”

“The plan? Uh, yeah, about that, um… there isn’t one?”

Nobody said anything for a few seconds.

“You’re joking, right?”

I didn’t know how to reply, so I went with not replying at all.

“Nick, we might _die_! And you’re tellin’ me we’re supposed to sit here and do nothing?”

I sighed. “For now. it’s all we _can_ do. I’ll try to think of something.”

* * *

 

“Wake up, Nick.”

I really enjoy sleeping. Sometimes the world just gets to be too much, and hopping into bed just sort of… _turns it off_. For several hours on end, I can just shut down and escape to something better. Dreams really are an amazing magical thing. Sure, sometimes there are nightmares, but in my case, they almost never amount to the burdens I have to deal with in real life.

“Nick, wake up.”

I didn’t have a tame collar on. I was in a huge field; green grass stood up all the way to my hips. To my right was Honey, wearing an incredibly wide smile. To my left was my mother, just as I remembered her from my youth. She looked young, happy. She was happy to be with _me._ We ran across the field, our pace fast but not tiring. Suddenly, over the horizon, I could make out roller coasters. A ferris wheel. A merry-go-round, log plume, carnival games, everything that one would expect to find in your average amusement park. It was beautiful.

The three of us made it to the tallest roller coaster in the park, and climbed the stairs like we were ascending to the heavens. My mother and I sat in the front, Honey in the seat just behind me. The coaster started forward, and connected with the chain to carry us up to the first plunge. The metallic clicking was surprisingly soothing. My mother took hold of my paw. I turned to look in her eyes. “I’m so proud of you, Nicky,” she whispered. She smiled at me. I smiled back. And then we reached the top. And then we dropped off the face of the Earth.

“Nick, we have to go _now_. Wake up.”

My eyes shot open, my body being lightly shaken by somebody next to my bed. The first thing I saw was the door to my cell was open. The next thing I saw was Judy Hopps, urging me to get up. I rubbed my eyes and slid into a sitting position. “Carrots? What’re you doin’ here?”

She brought a digit up to her lips and shushed me. Her head turned ninety degrees, nose twitching, her eyes scanning everything in view with her ears covering the rest. She focused her attention back to me.

“We’re leaving,” she whispered. “But you have to trust me.”

“What? What’s going on?” I answered, not lowering my volume. “Where are w–”

With a speed that would rival a cheetah, she jumped on top of my bed and clamped down on my muzzle. Not hard, but my reflexes forced me to grab her arm. Her paw remained unmoved from my mouth. Some stirring could be heard from the prisoners around the area, but nobody seemed to be awake. If somebody was, they weren’t making it known.

Again, she gave me the universal signal for ‘shut it’, and took her paw away from me.

“Where are we going?” I mouthed silently.

“Somewhere safe, but we have to hurry. I got the night guards to leave for a while, but they won’t be gone forever. Told them I had to do a “classified investigation” involving an inmate.”

“They just listened to you and abandoned their post?”

A sly smile spread across her face. “Being the face of the city comes with its perks. Now c’mon. I won’t make you wear a muzzle, but if anybody’s awake, they’ll be suspicious if they see you without pawcuffs.

She took out her pawcuffs and, not thinking, I held out my paws for her. But then some doubts ran their way across my mind. Right as the metal was about to click around my fur, I pulled my arms close to my chest.

“How do I know you’re not just taking me to the electric chair or something?” I questioned her defensively.

The bunny’s eyes widened with surprised innocence. “Electric chair? Nick, I would _never_ let that happen to you.”

“Sure, but you’d let it happen to any other predator, right?”

Her ears drooped, and her gaze dropped to the floor. “I can’t save everyone. It’s a hard truth that I have to face every day.” She looked back up at me with grim determination. “But I _know_ that I’m going to try and save you. I have to.”

I stayed immobile. She could tell I wasn’t letting up just yet.

“And even if you don’t trust me,” she continued, “you only have one other option. And that’s wait here here until somebody decides to _actually_ kill you. So, what’ll it be?”

I weighed my options for a few seconds. “I’m not leaving Honey here.”

“What?”

“The badger you found me with. She’s my friend, and I’m not leaving her behind.”

Judy brought her paws to her hips, tapping her foot. “She’ll be safe. I’ll make sure of it.”

I still didn’t move.

“Nick.” She put a paw on my shoulder. “I promise that your friend will not be harmed. Swear on my life.”

“Scout’s honor?” I asked.

She chuckled. “Sure, Nick. Scout’s honor.”

We looked at each other in the eyes for a couple moments until Judy leapt back onto the floor.

“Now,” she declared triumphantly, yet still keeping to a whisper, “let’s get a move on.”

I got off the bed and put my paws behind my back, letting the rabbit snap on the pawcuffs. She led me out of my cell and into the hallway, directing me the opposite way of where I came in. We passed by Honey’s cell on our way to a large steel door at the end of the corridor. She was asleep, but it seemed fitful. I started to take note of the inmates as they entered and faded from my line of sight. Unsurprisingly, they were all predators.

Judy kept one paw on my pawcuffs while she punched in a passcode on the keypad by the door handle - 0451. It made a small beep as access was granted, and we moved into the next room. Once the door shut behind me, I found myself in a storage room with shiny metal walls and a plethora of police equipment. Lockers and heavy safes surrounded me. As I glanced around, I felt a tug on my shirt that bent me over and I heard two clicks. The identity of the first click was revealed immediately as my paws came free from their cuffs. I watched myself stretch and flex my fingers, when suddenly, my collar fell off my neck, straight into my paws. I blinked several times in disbelief  and turned around, mouth open in shock.

“C-Carrots…?”

“What?” Judy answered nonchalantly. “You think that I’m letting you walk around with that torture machine around your throat? Pfft! Not if I have anything to about it.”

“But… but what if somebody sees me? They’ll scream bloody murder! They’ll–”

“ _Nothing_ will happen as long as you stick with me, OK?. We’re f-”

Her ears shot up. “Uh, I _may_ have to rescind that statement,” she said urgently. “Somebody’s coming. Ummm…” She looked around until her eyes landed on a large, open safe. “Quick! In there! Don’t make a _sound_!”

Slipping the tame collar into my pocket, I rushed into the metal cube, shutting the latch just enough that I was hidden from view, but a sliver of light still crept in. I heard the beeping of the keypad, and the door to the room creak open.

“Lt.  Hopps!” someone exclaimed frantically. “Th-there’s a pred missing from his cell! A fox! He’s on the loose! He’s–”

“Would you shut up and calm down for a second, Officer?” Judy replied. “Do you not remember me specifically saying that I was pursuing  a classified investigation with an inmate?”

“N-no, I mean yeah, b-but–”

“But what? Did it not cross your pea-sized brain that _maybe_ I had something to do with this ‘missing inmate’?”

“I just thought I should let you know just in case.”

“There is no ‘just in case’. _I took care of him._ You don’t need to worry about him anymore, and in turn, don’t need to waste my time with any more dumb questions. Now, return to your post.”

“...yes LT.”

I heard the keypad beep. The door opening. The door closing. And then silence.

I slowly crept out of the empty safe, standing up and stretching my limbs.

“Jesus, Carrots,” I said. “You really laid it on him, huh?”

“Like I said,” she answered, “being the face of the city comes with its perks.”

“Acting like that is a _perk_ for you?” I laughed.

“Uh, _yeah_! Cute little bunny verbally demolishing any big mammal that comes her way? It’s awesome!”

“You’re an _evil_ little bunny if anything. That was hard to listen to.”

“Nothing compared to the way you treated _me_ when I tried to arrest you for false advertising , ay, Slick?” She softly punched me on the arm and started to walk across the room.

“Heh, yeah…” I slumped my shoulders. I _was_ pretty awful to Judy when we first met. Quite unnecessarily, I might add. She had - however patronizing - stuck her neck out for me in that ice cream shop, and I played her for a fool without a single hesitation. And to top it off, I tore her down with a sarcastic ‘pep-talk’ that was solely intended to demoralize her. Heck, it could’ve made her quit the force. But at the time I didn’t care. But now, I wondered if I’d been too-

“Whatcha waiting for, Nick? Let’s go!”

I shook back into awareness to see  Judy looking impatient.

 _Don’t do it Wilde. You know it’s a mistake._ _She can’t be trusted._

I hesitated for just a moment ...

And then I followed the rabbit.


	16. Foxfight

“So,” Judy started, “in order to my little hideout, we’ll be going outside. Obviously we’ll run into a bit of trouble if someone sees you. If anyone finds out you’re a predator, we can easily lie our way back to safety—I’m your escort and I’m taking you back to Happytown.”

I nodded as Judy started digging through the police equipment. It was very messily organized for something as important as weapons and armor.

“The problem arises if someone, somehow, notices that you’re staying under my watchful eye overnight,” Judy continued. “Under no circumstances has any predator _ever_ stayed in the city center overnight. Sounds like a stupid rule, I know, but the idiots making the laws around here have a raging paranoia regarding predator biology in the nighttime. Their reasoning is that several types of predators have exemplary night vision, and—with absolutely no research I might add—decided predators are more likely to go savage after the sun goes down.”

Judy rolled her eyes wearily.

“But, I digress. Back to how we’ll sneak you from point A to point B. I have no personal forms of transportation, and the squad cars we have are police issued and have to stay in the lot after we leave, so we’re going to have to walk. This means we’re going to have to have to cover up at the very least your face, paws, feet, and that big fluffy wuffy tail of yours. It’s gonna seem a bit overkill, but the best thing I could come up with is a complete bomb defusal suit.”

She pulled out a large, bulky helmet from one of the lockers, displaying it for me.

I raised an eyebrow. “Uh . . .” I said.

“We’ll strap that gear on, head out the door, and be at the safehouse in around twenty minutes. Got everything?”

I stared down at the bunny in utter confusion, mouth agape. “Um, I put on a bomb defusal suit, you take me to safehouse,” I repeated. “Got it.”

“Good,” she congratulated. “Let me get it all ready for you.”

* * *

The suit didn’t fit so well, having been clearly designed with a smaller mammal in mind. My feet and muzzle were uncomfortably stuffed inside, and my tail was shoved up against my back. The inside of all the armor was practically baking me like an oven. Sweat soaked the fur on my face, and my tongue flopped out of my mouth as I began to pant reflexively.

“Geez, Carrots,” I complained. “Every time I take a breath it fogs up the whole helmet. It’s getting hard to see.” A realization crossed my mind suddenly. “Wait, if I can see out this thing, can’t people see in?”

Judy paused and blinked. “Rats!” she yelled. “I didn’t think of that!”

“Careful with the derogatory language, Carrots. You never know who might take offense.”

“Sorry,” she apologized, not picking up on my sarcasm. “Umm . . . we’re going to have to find some way to cover that up . . . hmm . . .” The bunny looked around the room. “Say, Nick? You mind if you can see or not?”

I spotted what Judy was eyeing and sighed. “Is this completely, one-hundred percent necessary?” I asked.

“Unless you have a better idea, mhmm.” She walked over to a nearby shelf and grabbed a can of black spray paint.

“Hold still, Nick,” Judy chuckled. “This’ll all be over soon.”

Black paint started to engulf my vision until my world was completely caked in darkness.

“Don’t ya think the ZPD will notice a missing bomb defusal suit?” _And why in the world do they have spray paint in their utility room?_ I silently wondered.

“Eh, they’ll manage. If I’m asked any questions I’ll just pin it on a newer recruit.” She grabbed my paw. “Let’s roll.”

A tug on my arm signaled the direction I was meant to go. I heard a door open, and Judy warned me of an oncoming staircase. She slowly and carefully guided me down, and as my feet felt the tough graininess of concrete I felt the warm night air sneak its way into my suit.

This was the first time in over three years I had been walking around the city after the sun had set. There was a different atmosphere in Zootopia— Even through the smothering of the bomb suit,I could hear it; I could smell it; I could feel it.

Even before my coma, Happytown was known for an air of viciousness. The unfortunately named borough was on an entirely different spectrum than its prey-filled counterpart, and the difference was unmistakable. The city is safe, funded, and fit for living. Happytown was the pure opposite–crime ridden, impoverished, and barely better than a box under a bridge.

“You doing alright, Nick?” The bunny asked, still tugging me along. We had been walking for maybe ten minutes, and that was the first time anybody had broken the silence.

It took me a while to think an appropriate, Nick-like response. “I’ll manage,” I replied.

“And what does ‘managing’ consist of for you?”

Now _that_ was something I never truly thought about. You know, I _manage_ , I wanted to say.

I finally settled on an explanation. “Doing what it takes to keep myself alive.”

But then I thought of something more.

“I’m starting to realize that staying alive isn’t enough. I don’t just want to stay alive, Carrots. I want to _live._ ”

Judy sighed heavily and was quiet for a long moment.. “I want you to live, too, Nick . . . but no matter what happens, no matter how this turns out, I implore you: _try_.”

“Do I have any other choi-”

My right foot suddenly reeled off what I assume was the curb. I lost my balance in the thick, clunky suit and fell over sideways. I yelled out an obscenity right before I hit the ground, and clenched my eyes, awaiting the pain of electric shock.

It didn’t come.

I let out a breath of relief when I remembered that my tame collar was not around my neck, but safely tucked away in my pocket.

“Oh my gosh, Nick! Are you alright?” Judy cried. She grabbed hold of me and helped me regain my footing.

“Yep,” I answered. “Never been better.”

A small smile tugged at the edge of Judy’s face.

“I’m not gonna lie, Nick, that tumble was pretty darn funny,” she laughed.

“Heh, yeah,” I said. “In this gear I probably made the ground shake.”

“Probably pushed the whole planet out of orbit!”

We laughed together and continued walking. And for just a moment, I could almost forget the coma, the press conference, everything.

But only for a moment.

“Only a few more blocks to go,” Judy said after a short time. “Not much longer now.”

Even blind I could tell that we passed by some other mammals on our way to . . . wherever we were going. Conversations sputtered and faltered before coming to a complete stop as we approached, and then continued again when we were safely past. I felt the discomforting weight of nervous gazes on my back, and anxiety began to gnaw at my chest. I must have been quite the scene.

“Once we’re in, don’t say a word unless I signal you to,” Judy warned. “If anybody says anything to us, let me do the talking. Got it?”

I nodded my head, but quickly realized the rabbit wouldn’t be able to see it under the large helmet. I held out a thumbs-up as an alternative.

“Alright. Follow my lead.”

A tug on my paw led me through a door. I felt the gush of air under the helmet that signified my passing indoors; the coolness of air conditioning tingled at my hot pelt and filled me with physical relief. Judy’s pace quickened, and I had no other choice but to follow along or tumble down again. It was clear she was in a hurry, and I guessed that she didn’t want to be spotted by someone.

“Ah, Judy!” a voice rang out, feminine but scratchy and old; it sounded like someone desperately tired but pretending not to be. “And a . . . guest. Judy, may I ask the reason for your strangely dressed friend?”

Judy turned me around and started to speak. “Ms. Armadillo! So nice to see you as always!”

“It’s pronounced Arma-dee-yo, Judy,” the landlady corrected.

“My apologies, Ms. Arma-dee-yo.”

It amused me how Judy’s terrible accent completely butchered the poor lady’s name.

“I’m afraid that my, uh . . . acquaintance is here is staying for official ZPD business, so I’m not at liberty to reveal any information. But don’t worry! I can assure you that neither you nor  anyone in this building is in any form of danger.”

“Is it really necessary to have that strange suit, though?” the voice of Ms. Armadillo asked.

“It most certainly is. Now if you’ll kindly let me–”

“How does this mammal see out of that helmet? The glass looks pitch black.”

I heard Judy take a deep, irritated breath. “You may not be able to see him, but he is able to see you clear as day, and if you _were_ able to see his face, you’d realize that he’s growing impatient. Isn’t that right, Officer?”

She nudged me with her elbow.

“Oh!” I nervously cleared my throat. “Uh, yes! Th-that is correct. I am growing impatient, and would love to be getting upstairs.”

“Right,” Ms. Armadillo said. “I’m sorry, but I have just one more question for you.”

“Yes?” Judy said.

“This isn’t some . . . _sexual_ thing, is it?”

Even blinded by the helmet, I could practically see the death glare Judy had to be leveling at her landlady.  . “Not that it’s any of _your_ business what I do in _my_ apartment Ms. Armadillo, but no. Police business.” Judy’s tone had lost any semblance of friendliness, replaced with an icy evenness. “Now I’m gonna go upstairs. Good night, Ms. Armadillo.”

“Good night, Judy,” Ms. Armadillo said hesitantly.

I was taken around a corner and could hear the movement of an elevator soon after. It came to our floor with a _ding,_ and the rabbit and I stepped inside.

“See?” Judy said once the doors closed and the elevator was rising. “Not so bad, huh?”

“I think I’m a bit out of practice when it comes to lying my way out of a situation,” I said.

“I’m sure you’ll get your mojo back in no time, Slick.”

Gravity felt like it increased as the elevator came to a halt. Judy guided me down another hallway and stopped us. I heard the jingling of keys, the unlocking of a door, and the creaking of hinges. I was moved forward a few more feet and then the door shut.

“Okey dokey, Nick!” Judy said excitedly. “The mask can come off now. Welcome to La Casa de Judy!”

“La Casa de Judy?” I asked, confused. After some tugging, I managed to tear the helmet from my head. “Oh, you’ve gotta be kidding me.”

I found myself in an apartment room that couldn’t be any more than ten by twenty feet. A bed was tucked in the corner, with only a desk, a nightstand, and a mirror to complete the furnishing of the residence. A tiny window let the moonlight leak in, shining on the bunny in the middle of it all, who was wearing a considerably nervous smile.

“You told me we were going somewhere safe,” I said dumbfounded. I looked down at the helmet in my paws. The black spray paint on the front was still shiny, and the smell was strong. I’d always sorta liked the scent, even though I knew  that inhaling paint was anything but good for me.

“It’s safe here,” Judy argued. “Nobody knows you’re a predator and you can just stay here until we figure things out. My neighbors are even out of town for the week, so we don’t have to worry too much about volume.”

“Rabbit . . .”

I dropped the helmet to the floor. It rolled on its top for a few seconds trying to find equilibrium. “We’re in you’re fucking _apartment_.” My voice remained the same level, but the ferocity in my tone greatly increased. Judy’s smile dropped, her ears drooped behind her head, and she backed away a couple steps.

“Listen, this is the best I could do. I–”

“I’ll bet there are dozens of mammals living in this building. All prey. I’ll bet if one of them had even the slightest suspicion that a _predator_ is here, the ZPD will be swarming this joint and I’ll be killed on sight. I’ll bet . . .”

I trailed off, sighed, and sat down cross-legged on the carpet. “What happened to ‘Being the face of the city has its perks,’ hm? Why don’t you have a nice house all to yourself instead of this tiny, useless broom closet?”  
Judy’s ears dropped, and her eyes turned glossy. She started stuttering. “I–I . . . I couldn’t bring myself to reward myself for the . . . _suffering_ of other innocent mammals. It wouldn’t be right.”

“Oh, drop the act Hopps.” I spat. “If you really had any good intent towards predators you would’ve quit and actually _done_ something to help us. Or at the very least you’d be back in Bunnyburrow growing carrots—and trust me, that would be _far_ more to our benefit than what you’re doing now.”

I got to my feet and walked to the window, ignoring that Judy was in my way. She jumped to the side, frightened, with her back against the wall. I gazed out the window, paws clasped behind my back, and followed the passing cars with my eyes. They looked like fireflies, zooming through the night without a care in the world.

“This story isn’t going to have a happy ending,” I said. “Even if predators are allowed back into society, even if the shock collars are banned, even if _you_ disappear, the damage has already been done. Predators are hated– _despised_ –by I assume every prey in Zootopia. We’re done for. It’s over. You might as well just kill us all. At least that would spare us from waking up every day wondering if today’s the day we’re going to go savage.” I turned to face Judy, who stared at me with an expression of despair. “This story isn’t going to have a happy ending,” I repeated.

Done with my monologue, I began to strip off the rest of the thick suit. My clothes underneath were damp with sweat, but I didn’t care too much. I wasn’t in much of a caring mood at the time.

Finally free of the wearable prison, I went over and sat on Judy’s bed. With idle interest I noticed the blanket had a pattern of carrots stitched into the cloth. Judy may have been an exceptional rabbit, but she was still a rabbit it seemed.

“Mind if I sit here?” I asked the bunny.

Judy, who had her arms crossed and was nibbling her lower lip, gave a slight nod. The mattress was soft. Much softer than the one I spent three years on in the hospital, and considerably softer than the cot I used in jail. It was a nice change of pace.

I fell back on the bed with my arms spread out, appreciating its comfort, and sighed.

“You know, Carrots, I was wrong. This place would actually be pretty cozy if I wasn’t a criminal on the run. Plus–“

“Nick, prey can go savage,” Judy interrupted, her voice low and serious. .

“–the carrot themed blanket, although cheesy and awfully unnecessary, can actually…”

I paused while my brain caught up to my ears.

“What did you say?”

“Prey,” Judy said deliberately. “They can go savage. Just like predators.”

I sat up and eyed her cautiously. “Carrots, I know that landlady pissed you off but I’m really not in the mood for sex jokes right now.”

She eyed me back, expression stern and dead set. “This isn’t a joke, Nick. Remember the Night Howlers?”

I racked my brain. “Uh…the wolves that guarded Cliffside Asylum, right?”

“No. That’s what we _thought_ , Nick. It was a good guess, but we were way off. Emmett Otterton wasn’t warning us about timberwolves. He was warning us about a plant.”

“A plant?”

“Midnicampum holicithias. It’s a class 3 botanical often used by farmers to keep pests away from their produce. It’s a much healthier alternative to pesticide, but eating them, touching them, or even getting to close to them can make a mammal—predator or prey—go savage.”

“So what, you’re saying somebody was using the Night Howlers to–“

“To frame the predators and cast them away from society, yes.”

“Who would do this? Who the hell would _do_ this?”

Judy cleared her throat. “Dawn Bellwether,” she said.

I paused, then slowly got off the bed and stood over the rabbit. She no longer looked intimidated.

“Lemme get this straight, Carrots. Bellwether, the cute little ewe with the way too big glasses now Mayor of Zootopia, framed every single predator in existence, casting us away from livable society and heaping what is no doubt eternal prejudice on us . . . with a plant?”

She gave a short sniff and looked up into my eyes. “It–it sounds crazy, but yes.”

“No, Hopps, it _is_ crazy. You expect me to believe this shit when you practically run the ZPD?”

“I have less power than you think,” she said softly, but still holding her ground.

“ _You_ have less power than you think? The face of the city? The bunny who can scare a ram so bad he starts blubbering like a buffoon? News flash, Carrots, this entire situation is _your_ fault! How the fuck do you sit back and let countless predators endure this–this oppression. This _slavery.”_

I poked my finger into her chest as I got more and more angry.

“Is this some elaborate prank or something? Getting my hopes with some made up story about magical plants only to laugh in my face during a public execution? You don’t care about me. You never did. You’re sick, Fluff.”

She gave me a hard push on the chest and I stumbled back onto the bed. The springs creaked, hinting for a moment they were going to give out. They didn’t.

“Don’t you _dare_ pin this whole thing on me, Nick.” I’d never seen a rabbit growl before; I clearly had struck a nerve.  “I _never_ wanted this to happen, and now I have to live with the guilt of knowing I could have done something about it _so_ much sooner. You think I _want_ every predator to live like this? That I get _pleasure_ out of it? You’re wrong. You’re so wrong I can’t even describe it in words.”

She got closer to me and started poking _her_ finger in _my_ chest, adding to my ever increasing frustration.

“I _care_ about you,” she continued, voice cracking. “Why can’t you see that? I want to make things right!”

Something inside me snapped. My paw shot out, forcing Judy’s arm away from me, and I kicked her in the stomach, sending her flying against the wall. She gasped desperately, the wind knocked out of her.

I got off the bed and jumped over to her, throwing a punch for her face. She stepped to the side quicker than I thought any mammal capable of. She grabbed my arm and twisted it behind me like I was a cheap action figure. The bunny forced me onto the ground, slamming my face against the dusty carpet, and I cried out in pain as she pushed my arm even further behind my back.

“Stop!” I cried. “I’m sorry! Please! Stop!”

“You–“

The ears on both of our heads shot up as we heard the sound of the door unlocking. Judy let go of me and sprang up, jumping from one end of the room to another in a single hop. She slammed the door back shut before it got halfway open.

“Judy?” The voice of Ms. Armadillo asked from the other side of the door. “What’s going on in there?”

“Don’t you know how to knock?” Judy yelled in reply. “You can’t just walk in on us!”

“I’ve been knocking for nearly a minute now, Judy,” Armadillo said. “We’ve been getting complaints of…um…loud thumping and squealing.”

Judy sighed. “We’ll keep it down, Ms. Armadillo. Sorry.”

“Sure…”

As the clitter-clatter of clawed feet told us the landlady was walking away, both of us heard: “That sex-crazed bunny is going to be the death of me.”

Judy sighed again and took her paws off the door. She turned around and watched me brush myself off and try to stem the nosebleed I’d earned from being slammed on the ground. My snout was still sensitive from the last break, so it hadn’t taken much to make it bleed.

“I’m sorry,” we both said at the same time.

“I thought–“

“I didn’t–“

We both stopped.

“You first,” she said.

“I…um…I lost control back there. I don’t want to hurt you, Carrots. I’m just so angry, and it bubbled over.” I looked down and smiled wryly. “I guess you can add assaulting a police officer to my list of charges.”

We both laughed.

“I think we’ve got bigger things to worry about,” she said. “I was getting emotional, and we were both heated, and…yeah.”

I scratched the back of my neck. “Um…so—assuming this is all true—how’d you find out about it?” I asked.

She walked over to me and gently pinched my snout.

“You’re going to want to pinch it heat to stop the bleeding faster,” she suggested.

“Yeah,” I said, doing as she demonstrated.

Judy sat down on her bed, and I leaned against the wall, my nose pointed up to the ceiling.

“A little bit after the press conference, the one we last saw each in before the…accident…I was approached by Chief Bogo. The mayor had  a proposal for me,” she began.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did it! I actually updated! I’m finally starting to realize how stupid and pointless writing this in the first person is. It’s terrible. Anyway, thanks for sticking with me. Next update will be out by January 31. Check out my new fanfic, Zootopia: Mirage, if you’re interested in legitimate WildeHopps and the further pain and suffering of cartoon animals. Bye bye!


	17. ANNOUNCEMENT REGARDING THE STATE OF THIS FIC

Hey everybody, Cuttooth here. I recently sat down to write the newest chapter of this story, and after I wrote a thousand words I realized that I absolutely despise this story. Like, it’s the polar opposite of fun to write. I know I said that I would finish this story on several occasions, but if I hate writing it and also hate what I write, it’s not going to turn out any good. The words for this story never came out naturally. For other things I’ve written, things I actually enjoy working on, the words just flow and it feels good to me. Is this story dead? I’m not entirely sure. If the motivation comes back I wouldn’t be opposed to writing a chapter. I do have the rest of this story planned out for the most part, but I also need to write the words and execute it correctly. For now, I’m going to focus on my other story because it satisfies me much more creatively than what I’m currently getting out of Under an Iron Fist. I know that I’m letting down a few hundred people by doing this, and I’m really sorry it turned out this way, but I can’t force myself to write something I hate. Thanks for reading this far. I’ll hopefully see you guys later!


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